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Candidates for Finra board seek to qualify

Four potential candidates for a small-firm seat on the board of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc. are scrambling to qualify for the upcoming ballot.

Small-firm challengers had to have gathered the signatures of 125 like-sized member firms by last Friday to get their names on the ballot. Finra then will certify the petitions and send ballots out at the end of the month, with the vote count concluding Aug. 3 at its annual meeting.

The holder of the open small-firm seat, Ken Norensberg, a compliance consultant and chief operating officer of Tritaurian Capital Inc., is seeking re-election.

The challengers are Alan Davidson, founder of Zeus Securities Inc. in Hauppauge, N.Y.; John Moloney, chief executive of Moloney Securities Co. Inc. in Manchester, Mo.; and Carrie Wisniewski, a compliance consultant and president of Bridge Capital Associates Inc. in Lilburn, Ga.

As of this year, Finra’s nominating committee no longer nominates small-firm candidates, leaving it up to member firms to nominate their own picks via a petition process.

In recent years, challengers from small firms have been successful in beating out candidates picked by Finra’s nominating committee.

TRADING BARBS

But the petition process hasn’t eliminated the sniping among candidates; Mr. Davidson and Mr. Norensberg already have traded barbs.

Mr. Davidson said that Mr. Norensberg unfairly gained an advantage by soliciting petitions prior to a May 3 Finra election notice. Mr. Norensberg denies that.

Both men said that they have more than enough signatures to get on the ballot. Mr. Moloney said that he he was unsure whether he would get enough signatures by last Friday.

Ms. Wisniewski said that she needed about 10 more.

She complained that Mr. Norensberg sent e-mails soliciting petitions within three hours of Finra’s posting its election notice, while it took her several days to obtain the updated member-firm e-mail list from Finra.

Finra’s board has 22 members.

Three governors come from small broker-dealers, three from large firms and one from a midsize firm.

E-mail Dan Jamieson at [email protected].