SEC’s Former IM Director Champ to Join Kirkland & Ellis

By Melanie Waddell

January 27, 2016 at 06:19 AM

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Norm Champ, the former director of the Securities and Exchange Commission's Division of Investment Management, will become a partner in Kirkland & Ellis' private funds group starting Feb. 1.

Champ left his post last January to become a visiting scholar for the 2015 spring term at Harvard Law School, where he also was also a lecturer in law on a biennial basis teaching a course on investment management law.

"Norm has broad and deep experience in today's extraordinarily complex and high-stakes regulatory environment for investment firms, and he will be a tremendous resource for our clients," said Jeffrey Hammes, chairman of Kirkland's Global Management Executive Committee, in a statement.

While at the SEC, Champ not only served as the IM director, but he also was the deputy director of the SEC's Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations.

Since leaving the Commission, Champ has criticized the SEC's plan to require advisors to get third-party audits, stating such audits will be costly for advisors and their clients and could have unintended consequences.

Champ said that before moving ahead with a third-party exam rule, the SEC should instead "reallocate its own resources and improve its productivity," namely by shifting some of the 200 examiners devoted to broker-dealer exams to advisor exams.

Before joining the SEC in 2010, Champ was executive vice president and general counsel of Chilton Investment Co., an investment advisor to long/short equity hedge funds and managed accounts. He holds an A.B., summa cum laude, in history from Princeton University and a J.D., cum laude, from Harvard Law School. He was also a Fulbright scholar at King's College London, where he received his M.A. in war studies.

He is currently writing a book about his experiences at the SEC.

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