AFC in Practice: How Criminals Profit from Large Order Securities Trades

Stephanie Clark is an Associate – AFC, Thought Leadership, supporting the development of a variety of ACAMS’ thought leadership initiatives and publications. Prior to ACAMS, Stephanie was a financial crimes consultant at Wells Fargo Advisors, the investment arm of Wells Fargo Bank. She has previous experience in regulatory compliance at SunTrust Bank, as well as English and French language-enhanced due diligence research and investigations at Kroll, a corporate intelligence consultancy. Through her career, Stephanie’s focus on enhanced due diligence, open-source research, transaction monitoring, and know-your-customer (KYC) investigations has gained her a breadth of knowledge in second-line, anti-money laundering (AML) compliance at financial institutions. She has a master’s degree in international relations from George Mason University, where her research focused on French foreign policy.

Dr William Scott Grob, CAMS-FCI, CGSS, FRM, CAIA, is the Director of Research and Analysis, responsible for promoting quantitative research methods. He has built customized programs, such as the two Illegal Wildlife Trade certificates developed with the WWF & WJC and the two Ending Modern Slavery & Human Trafficking with the FAST Initiative & Polaris. Previously, he was the ACAMS AML Director for the Americas and Asia. Dr. Grob has over 25 years of financial and banking expertise. His most recent role was as Regional Head of Affiliates Management, HSBC, where he worked on mitigating financial crime and correspondent banking risks across Asia. His 12-year career at the bank also included managing risk within the Equity/FX prime brokerage business, Structured Funds business, and Hedge Fund units.

Peter Gonzalez leads FINRA’s Special Investigations Unit in its mission to proactively combat and mitigate fraud threats facing investors and the markets.

Prior to joining AFI, Peter served as a Senior Principal Investigator conducting high complexity special investigations within FINRA’s Crypto Asset Investigations team.

Peter proudly supports FINRA’s Diversity Equity and Inclusion efforts contributing throughout his career to FINRA’s Racial Justice Task Force, Diversity Leadership Summit, and Employee Resource Groups.

Fluent in Spanish, Peter holds a master’s degree in finance from Florida International University.

Alison K. Jimenez is President of Dynamic Securities Analytics, Inc. where she utilizes her extensive background in the financial industry to consult and provide expert witness testimony on complex matters involving financial crime, fraud, and Anti-Money Laundering (‘AML’). Ms. Jimenez’s expertise in illicit finance has been sought out by federal and international agencies including DOJ, DOD, DHS, and the United Nations.

Ms. Jimenez has been retained as a testifying expert in federal and state courts, domestic and international arbitration, and criminal and regulatory enforcement actions on a variety of financial crime issues including corruption, business email compromise, cryptocurrency scams, and Ponzi schemes.

Alison has published original research on financial crime topics including cryptocurrency crime, human smuggling, and Suspicious Activity Reports. The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, American Banker, and government agencies have cited Alison’s research.

Ms. Jimenez frequently presents on AML and fraud issues at national and international conferences including at Interpol, the World Bank, and the North American Securities Administrators Association. In addition, Alison testified before the House Financial Services subcommittee on Digital Assets on the use of cryptocurrency in illicit activity.

Alison serves on the Irregular Warfare Center- Defense of the Homeland and Counter Threat Finance working groups and previously served as a member of U.S. Special Operations Command- Working Group on Counter Threat Finance. Alison also serves on the Fraudulent Virtual Assets Services working group of the Global Coalition to Fight Financial Crime. Ms. Jimenez previously served on the Education and Examination Task Forces for the Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists (ACAMS).

Prior to this role, Alison worked at a large financial services firm and was a securities regulator. Ms. Jimenez holds a master’s degree in economics and is a Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist.