High profile appointment

5/10/2009

David Mayhew (1967-71) has been appointed as the new Securities Commission’s Commissioner for Financial Advisers, his new role recently announced by the Commerce Minister Simon Power.

David Mayhew

David will return from Britain in January to oversee the drafting, approval and implementation of a professional code of conduct for financial advisers. He will also automatically become a member of the Securities Commission.

In recent years David has worked for Herbert Smith, a London-based leading and full-service international legal practice with a 1,100-lawyer network across Europe and Asia where he is widely recognised as a leading practitioner in contentious financial services regulatory work. He joined Herbert Smith having been Leading Advocate at the Financial Services Authority from 2001 and acting Director of Enforcement in 2005.

David has combined his significant experience of working for major financial services institutions with his experience of working at a senior level within the FSA. Recent work includes advising senior executives on appearances before the Treasury Select Committee inquiries into the financial crisis. He is also an experienced advocate and sat as a Recorder (part-time judge) in the Crown Court for six years.

Among his credentials are extensive experience in representing financial institutions in, and advising senior management on, regulatory investigations and enforcement proceedings, including multi-jurisdictional regulatory action (cross-border securities and derivatives trading); representing solicitors in disciplinary investigations and proceedings by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (e.g. the Law Society action against two Freshfields partners in relation to Marks and Spencer); he represented the FSA in most of its cases in the Financial Services and Markets Tribunal from implementation of the new regulatory regime in 2001 until 2005; he represented FSA Enforcement in the design, implementation and subsequent review of the internal decision–making process (report July 2005); and has extensive experience in High Court commercial litigation (eg: arising out of the collapses of a financial services group; the interest rate swap market for local authorities; and the International Tin Council).