Arbitration on Claims Under
The Texas Securities Act
“Howie” was born and raised in Brooklyn, NY in a neighborhood where patriotism and service to our country was very strong.
Most of his friends’ fathers had served in various branches of the US military during World War 2 and Korea. His uncle (mom’s brother) landed on Normandy on June 6, 1944, with the US Army’s First Infantry Division and walked all the way to the Elbe river in Germany. His cousin (on dad’s side) was one of the US Navy’s first frogmen and was involved in clearing the beaches of Okinawa of underwater obstacles, as well the same duty during the amphibious landing at Inchon in Korea.
Given that environment it was no surprise that he enlisted in the Marine Corps upon graduation from high school. His motivation and dedication caused him to be trained and assigned to one of the first Marine UH-1 (aka Huey) squadrons as a crew chief/door gunner and sent to Viet Nam.
Upon returning to Brooklyn, his desire to serve the people of New York pointed him to the New York City Police Department where he spent 14 years, ten of which were with a Street Crime Suppression unit.
When Howie found out that his mother was terminally ill, he realized that his need to help others had to now be focused on his parents who were both in their early 80’s and he could not do that while remaining with the NYPD. So, he began working on Wall Street, learning and excelling in a new career.
After his mother’s passing, it became clear that his father could no longer stay in Brooklyn. The weather and high crime rates combined to force his dad to remain “a prisoner” in his apartment for almost 6 months out of the year so a change of scenery was necessary.
When it was decided that Southern California was the best choice, Howie reached out to many of the contacts he had made over the years and was hired by a mid-sized firm in Irvine, CA as a registered representative and portfolio manager. After almost 10 years with that firm, Howie and his business partner decided it was time to begin their own venture.
In 1999 they started a small firm that very quickly spun up in size to where there were 8 registered representatives in addition to Howie and his colleague, 4 registered sales assistants and were asset managers to over $1 Billion in assets, primarily from Texas institutions that were comprised of cities, counties and school districts.
In 2005, Howie and his business partner shook hands and agreed to divide the business into two entities. His partner would take over the transaction side and Howie would take the assets under management. Howie’s desire to move to Texas was motivated by his 2 adolescent daughters of which he was the sole custodian, and he felt that Texas was a far better place to raise the girls.
In the period since then, he has been the sole portfolio manager for $5 Billion in assets, seen his contract at that firm not renewed because the firm was sold, started his own Investment Advisor firm (which remains operational but does not accept any new clients) and begun working outside of the financial world.
Acting as the Claims Analyst for the Forman Law Firm, P.C. he can combine his law enforcement and investment experiences to establish whether the events that have occurred to a potential client who has contacted our firm is a violation of FINRA or SEC regulations, a violation of the Texas State Securities Board rules or other egregious actions that the Forman Law Firm P.C. can represent in the process to recover the client’s funds.
Howie’s FINRA exams passed include Series 4,7,8,24,53,63 & 65.
In his spare time, Howie likes to take his dogs on long walks, catch and release fishing on the dock at the end of his street and enjoys spending time with his wife and two daughters. One of his grandsons plays on a very high level “little league” travel team (U-14 is not “little league”, grandson is bigger than Howie) and any weekend where games are scheduled has Howie on a road trip with the team.