Quattrone Asks SEC To Overturn NASD's Lifetime Ban

by Glen Shapiro, LawAndTax-News.com, New York

04 March 2005

It emerged on Wednesday that former CSFB star banker, Frank Quattrone has asked the Securities and Exchange Commission to overturn the lifetime ban on working in the securities industry imposed on him by the National Association of Securities Dealers.

According to reports, Mr Quattrone is arguing that the NASD violated his constitutional right under the Fifth Amendment not to cooperate in an investigation.

He was convicted last year of hindering a probe into the allocation of shares in popular IPOs handled by CSFB in the 1990s, and was sentenced to 18 months in prison and obliged to pay a $90,000 fine, a verdict which he is also appealing.

Following delivery of the original sentence in 2004, the NASD launched a campaign to overturn an earlier panel ruling which banned the investment banker from the securities industry for just one year, arguing that:

"In view of the serious nature of Quattrone's misconduct and the lack of mitigating facts, we conclude that a bar is necessary in this case to protect the integrity of NASD's investigative responsibilities."

However, Mr Quattrone this week vowed to challenge the lifetime ban, in what his legal team dubbed a "landmark constitutional challenge".

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