Christina LaVera serves as counsel in the bank regulatory practice of the firm's Financial Services & Products Group. Ms. LaVera provides advice to banks and other financial institution on a wide range of regulatory, transactional and enforcement matters, including regulatory compliance, product development, corporate structuring and reorganization, merger and acquisition transactions, examinations, internal investigations, and the resolution of administrative and enforcement proceedings involving federal and state regulatory agencies. Ms. LaVera has extensive experience in various bank and financial regulatory matters, such as compliance with the Dodd-Frank Act, anti-money laundering requirements, affiliated transactions restrictions and recent student loan-related developments. In these and other areas, Ms. LaVera has worked with clients to perform risk assessments and develop and implement comprehensive compliance programs designed to mitigate risk both at the bank and corporate level. Ms. LaVera also has extensive experience working with bank and financial institution boards of directors, as well as handling a range of corporate governance matters.
- Financial Reform Legislation – evaluating the regulatory and operational consequences of current and anticipated federal legislation to reform the financial services industry, and working closely with clients to develop and implement comprehensive Dodd-Frank Act strategic action plans.
- Regulatory Developments – tracking and analyzing regulatory proposals, new and amended rules, supervisory guidance, enforcement actions, and examination trends, including focus on the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
- Overall Compliance – counseling clients subject to all levels of supervision (from highly-regulated depository institutions to unregulated providers of financial products and services) regarding compliance practices, including the creation and remediation of compliance programs designed to satisfy the full range of financial regulatory requirements.
- Remittance Transfer Advocacy and Compliance – drafting comment letters and other advocacy materials regarding the Dodd-Frank Act’s new remittance transfer requirements, and counseling clients with respect to the newly finalized remittance transfer rules and additional regulatory developments that relate to the extensive new compliance obligation for consumer-initiated cross-border transfers.
- Anti-Money Laundering Compliance – advising numerous and diverse financial institutions with complex bank secrecy and anti-money-laundering issues relating to regulatory examinations, contract negotiations, investment programs and overall regulatory compliance, including banks and non-bank financial institutions, such as several card associations, payment processors and other service providers.
- Vice chair of the ABA’s Banking Law Committee Subcommittee on Payments and Electronic Banking
- American Bar Associations, Business Law Section’s Committee on Banking Law
- District of Columbia Bar
- Maryland Bar