Attorney who fought Finra — and won — wins seat on board

Consider it a new twist on an old addage. Kevin Carreno beat Finra. Now, he's joining it. Mr. Carreno, owner and general counsel of International Assets Advisory LLC in Orlando, won the small-firm seat on the board of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc. The victory comes less than a year after Mr. Carreno successfully fended off a Finra enforcement case against him. In fact, he used his success in the case to gather support during his campaign. The attorney beat out two other candidates, Stephen Kohn, president of Stephen A. Kohn & Associates Ltd. in Lakewood, Colo., and Dock David Treece, a partner at Toledo, Ohio-based Treece Financial Services Corp. Votes for the seat, representing firms with less than 150 brokers, were tallied today at Finra's annual meeting. Finra's 21-person board has seven elected industry representatives, three from small firms. The small-firm candidates campaigned on issues of burdensome regulations and the need for Finra to get its fiscal house in order. Mr. Carreno took some heat from his opponents for being a lawyer. In the end, however, he attracted enough votes among the 4,000 smaller firms registered with Finra' to win the open seat. The final tally showed Mr. Carreno received 710 votes, followed by Mr. Kohn with 497 and Mr. Treece with 243. "I think more people were in favor of having someone who can understand the affects of regulation and rule proposals," Mr. Carreno said.