Michael K. Smith

Mike Smith is a Bates Consulting and Testifying Expert based in Bozeman, Montana. Throughout his 40-year securities and banking career, he has interacted at the highest levels of management, as well as with clients of all types and account sizes. As a result of this experience, Mr. Smith possesses an in-depth understanding of recruiting and employment practices, supervisory requirements, and sales practice regulations, as well as most investment products and services including Equities, Fixed Income, Mutual Funds, Investment Management, Options, Futures, Structured Products, Restricted Stock Transactions and Lending. As a Managing Director and Regional Manager, he was responsible for all aspects of the securities and banking activities within the Midwest region for three major firms: Lehman Brothers, Barclays Wealth, and Citi Private Bank.

Mr. Smith managed up to 110 registered representatives, including compliance and operational staff. He supervised an Office of Supervisory Jurisdiction (OSJ) and was consistently noted in audit findings for a "high level of compliance awareness with regulatory rules and firm policies." Mr. Smith possesses an extensive understanding of SEC/FINRA regulations.

At Citi Private Bank, Mr. Smith had direct management and supervisory responsibility for servicing 125 UHNW clients; collectively with $1B in deposits, $1B in managed investments and $2.5B in outstanding loans. Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) audits reported the business to be in excellent compliance with all policies and regulations.

During his tenure at Lehman Brothers, Mr. Smith directly supervised four business lines: retail brokerage and investment advisory, middle-market fixed income and equity sales, and corporate cash management. Revenues and AUM's exceeded $110M and $6.5B respectively. In addition, internal and external audit results improved dramatically as a result of his restructuring of the compliance and operations teams.

Mr. Smith has meaningful crisis management experience as a result of overseeing the cleanup (legal, regulatory, financial, personnel, etc.) of a 15-year ongoing Ponzi scheme that was discovered in the Cleveland, OH office of Cowen and Co. shortly after the acquisition of Cowen's retail operations by Lehman Brothers. In addition, Mr. Smith further honed his crisis management skills during the six months prior to and after Lehman Brothers bankruptcy filing in September 2008.