Benjamin M. Lawsky, the New York State Department of Financial Services’ initial superintendent of financial services, will depart the agency in late June, after four years in the post, officials confirm.
The agency was created by the New York State Senate in 2011, through the merger of two predecessor agencies, the New York State banking and insurance departments. Lawsky “conducted and oversaw” that merger, according to an NYDFS statement, which notes also that the NYDFS has “approximately 1,400 employees, primarily located in New York City and Albany, and … an operating budget of approximately $250 million.”
As superintendent, Lawsky “supervises all New York State-chartered banks, the majority of United States-based branches and agencies of foreign banking institutions, and all insurance companies in New York,” the NYDFS says. “He also regulates all of New York State’s mortgage brokers, mortgage bankers, check cashers, money transmitters, budget planners, and similar providers of financial services. Entities supervised by the Department number more than 3,800, with assets of more than $7 trillion.”
Lawsky also cochairs the governor’s cyber-security advisory board, serves as the receiver of the NYDFS’s liquidation bureau, which oversees the rehabilitation and liquidation of insurance companies, and is a member of the Empire State Development Corporation’s board of directors.
Before becoming superintendent, Lawsky was New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s chief of staff. Prior to that, he “helped run and manage” the New York State attorney general’s office, and before that, he “spent more than five years as an assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York, where he prosecuted white collar crime, organized crime, and terrorism cases, according to the statement.
“He began his career as chief counsel to Senator Charles Schumer on the Senate Judiciary Committee and as a trial attorney in the Civil Division of the Department of Justice,” officials add.
Superintendent Lawsky also is a member of the Joint Forum, an international body made up of banking, insurance and securities regulators from 15 countries, officials say. The Joint Forum addresses cross-sectoral issues among the three financial sectors and advises the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, the International Organization of Securities Commission and the International Association of Insurance Supervisors.
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