The Canadian Foundation for Advancement of Investor Rights (FAIR Canada) on Wednesday named Frank Allen as its new executive director, effective immediately.
Allen succeeds Neil Gross, who stepped down from the role last fall.
Allen has worked as a securities lawyer in private practice, and has served as general counsel at the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) and assistant deputy minister in the financial services policy division of Ontario’s Ministry of Finance.
During his time at Finance, Allen was “actively involved in the creation and launch of the Expert Committee to Consider Financial Advisory and Financial Planning Policy Alternatives and the negotiation and early implementation of the Cooperative Capital Markets Regulatory System,” FAIR Canada says in its announcement.
“Frank has over 35 years experience in the private sector as well as with government and securities regulators”, says Ermanno Pascutto, FAIR Canada chairman, in a statement. “He will add to our expertise on shareholder rights and consumer retail investor issues. I look forward to working with Frank and with Marian Passmore who continues as director of policy and COO. Marian has done an excellent job leading our policy advocacy particularly over the past year when FAIR Canada has been without an executive director.”
In a statement, Allen says he is, “committed to proactively advancing FAIR Canada’s mission to be a catalyst for enhancing the rights of Canadian shareholders and individual investors including being a national voice for investors in securities regulation. I am keen to work on the FAIR Canada team and share FAIR Canada’s dedication to robustly putting investors first and strongly advocating, alone and with partners, the investors’ perspective publicly and to regulators, policy makers and governments.”
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