Practice

About nine months after it floated the idea, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority has just asked the Securities and Exchange Commission to approve a rule change to establish a new registration category and qualification exam for certain operations personnel to be called operations professionals.

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority has not found any major abuses from its targeted examinations of broker-dealers that were either placement agents or worked with such agents to obtain business from municipalities and public pension funds, market sources said Tuesday.

While the financial services community waits for some movement from the SEC on new rules and policies governing advisors, the Labor Department has taken it upon itself to get the ball rolling in the name of better protecting investors and pensioners.

Roy Seay and Carolyn Edwards each worked at UBS for 11 years and together had $850,000 in annual production.

RIAs are embracing the idea of shaping their compliance procedures around what could go wrong.

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority has fined Dallas-based financial services company Southwest Securities Inc. $500,000 for soliciting violations related to its municipal securities business.

A well-prepared professional approaches turbulence and dire conditions that present themselves calmly and confidently, performance consultant Dr. Rick Jensen told attendees of the Bank Investment and Securities Association in the closing keynote Tuesday.

Social media has become an inescapable force, but many in the financial services industry are still holding back from using it.

Client satisfaction and loyalty are poor indicators of a likelihood to refer. Julie Littlechild, President of Advisor Impact, de-mystifies the process for advisors attending the FPA Business Solutions Conference 2011.

The brokerage adds Rob Pietroburgo from Wells Fargo to its Springfield, Ill., branch as part of its advisor and branch expansion strategy.