Annette Nazareth is a Senior Counsel at Davis Polk & Wardwell. Until 2021 Annette was a partner of the firm and headed the Trading and Markets practice in Davis Polk’s Financial Institutions Group, which is one of the most widely recognized practices in the field. She also served as Managing Partner of the firm’s Washington, D. C. office. Ms. Nazareth is an experienced financial markets regulator, former SEC Commissioner, and recognized authority on financial markets regulatory issues. She has spent much of her career advising boards of directors on corporate governance matters and corporations that were subject to regulatory and enforcement actions. She also advised domestic and international clients, including broker-dealers, swap dealers, exchanges, clearinghouses and other financial institutions, across a broad range of complex financial regulatory and legislative matters.  More recently, through her work as Chair of the Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market, Ms. Nazareth also is a recognized authority on voluntary carbon markets as a tool to accelerate net zero climate goals.

Ms. Nazareth has been a key player in financial services regulation for much of her career. She was a financial services policymaker for more than a decade. She was a Commissioner of the US Securities and Exchange Commission from 2005 to 2008.  She joined the SEC Staff in 1998 as a Senior Counsel to Chairman Arthur Levitt and then served as Interim Director of the Division of Investment Management. She served as Director of the Division of Trading and Markets from 1999 to 2005. As Director, she oversaw the regulation of broker-dealers, securities exchanges and clearing agencies. She also served as the senior staff member assisting the SEC Chairman on the President’s Working Group on Financial Markets. Ms. Nazareth also served as the Commission’s representative in international meetings as a member of the Financial Stability Forum from 1999 to 2008. 

In addition to her public board service as a member of the board of Broadridge Financial Solutions, Ms. Nazareth chairs two not-for-profit boards—The Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market (ICVCM) and the Urban Institute. ICVCM is an international organization that has established the standards for high-integrity carbon credit trading.  The Urban Institute is a nonpartisan think tank founded by President Lyndon Johnson to focus on challenges facing urban America.  She also serves on the boards of the Watson School for International and Public Affairs and the Board of Visitors of Columbia Law School, and is a member of the American Law Institute. Ms. Nazareth previously served on the boards of Brown University (Chair, Audit Committee); National Cathedral School (Chair, Audit Committee); Bishop John T. Walker School for Boys; St. Albans School of Public Service; the Protestant Episcopal Cathedral Foundation; and the SEC Historical Society (Chair and President).

Ms. Nazareth graduated from Columbia University School of Law, where she was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar, and Brown University, where she graduated magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa.