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U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission

Alexander F. Cohen, Deputy Chief of Staff, Leaving SEC

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
2008-280

Washington, D.C., Nov. 24, 2008 — The Securities and Exchange Commission announced today that Alexander F. Cohen, Deputy Chief of Staff and former Deputy General Counsel, will leave the agency on December 18, with plans to return to the private sector.

Since joining the Chairman’s office in May 2008, Mr. Cohen, 48, has assisted SEC Chairman Christopher Cox as senior legal counsel in the development and execution of the Commission’s program across the entire agency to promote investor protection, healthy markets, and capital formation. He also served as a liaison to Commissioners and senior agency staff on rulemaking, policy, and enforcement matters.

In that role, he was centrally involved in key initiatives by the Commission, including:

  • The SEC’s emergency and accelerated rulemakings in response to recent market turmoil.
     
  • A proposed roadmap for use of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) by U.S. issuers beginning in 2014.
     
  • Rules to provide investors with financial information on public companies using interactive data.
     
  • The SEC’s memoranda of understanding with the Federal Reserve and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

Other major initiatives during his time at the SEC included rules to allow foreign private issuers to file financial statements with the Commission in IFRS without reconciliation to U.S. GAAP, and rules to implement the Credit Rating Agency Reform Act of 2006.

Mr. Cohen joined the SEC staff in 2006 as Deputy General Counsel for Legal Policy and Administrative Practice. He was responsible in the Office of General Counsel for review of all aspects of the Commission’s regulatory program.

“Alex has done outstanding work for the benefit of investors,” said Chairman Cox. “His service to all of the Commissioners, and the close working relationships he developed with Commission staff in each of the Divisions and Offices, were exemplary. The SEC and the nation are fortunate to have had a leader of his caliber in these critical times.”

Mr. Cohen said, “It has been an honor and a privilege to work with Chairman Cox, the Commissioners, and the SEC’s superb staff. Recent market events have brought out the very best in the agency, and I am deeply grateful to the SEC’s dedicated men and women for their unceasing efforts — under extraordinary pressure and at all hours — on behalf of America’s investors.”

Prior to joining the SEC staff in 2006, Mr. Cohen was a partner in the international law firm of Latham & Watkins LLP, and co-chair of the firm’s Corporate Finance Practice Group. Mr. Cohen earned his J.D. from Yale University in 1988, and served as law clerk to Hon. Wilfred Feinberg of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit from 1989 to 1990. He received his M.A. in international relations from Yale University in 1985, and his B.A. cum laude in political science from Yale in 1982.

 

http://www.sec.gov/news/press/2008/2008-280.htm


Modified: 11/24/2008