Christy Goldsmith Romero is an internationally recognized expert and leader in the financial system, financial regulation, and enforcement. She has served as a financial regulator under four U.S. Presidents, served as a presidential appointee nominated by two of those Presidents, twice unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate, and testified before Congress 14 times. Professor Goldsmith Romero’s work has received substantial media coverage, and she is a sought-after speaker. Her teaching focuses on Corporations, regulation of financial markets, and future of finance issues.

Professor Goldsmith Romero served at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Treasury Department, and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). In June 2024, President Biden nominated her to be the Chairman and Board Member of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (which nomination was returned by the Senate in January 2025).

As a CFTC Commissioner from 2022-2025, appointed by President Biden, Professor Goldsmith Romero led the financial regulator during a time of expansion in markets and global uncertainty. There she promoted responsible innovation and resilience to market risk (including geopolitical risk, cyber risk, and climate financial risk). She sponsored the Technology Advisory Committee where she added experts in AI, cryptocurrency, stablecoins, blockchain, FinTech, and cybersecurity. The Committee released landmark reports on digital assets, and artificial intelligence in financial markets. She also continued her career-long enforcement record of combatting fraud and other illegality and advancing investor and consumer protection.

Prior to the CFTC, Professor Goldsmith Romero served as the Special Inspector General of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (SIGTARP) at the Treasury Department, appointed by President Obama, a role where her service continued through President Trump’s first administration. There she led a law enforcement and audit watchdog office conducted oversight over the government’s response to the financial crisis. SIGTARP served as a non-partisan resource to Congress reporting on the financial system. SIGTARP was also a white-collar law enforcement agency whose investigations resulted in recoveries of $11.4 billion, criminal charges by the Department of Justice and state prosecutors against 465 defendants (including 75 bankers sentenced to prison and 121 homeowner scammers sentenced to prison), and civil charges by the DOJ, the SEC, and others against 25 entities including large financial institutions.

Professor Goldsmith Romero also served at the SEC, as counsel to two SEC Chairs Christopher Cox and Mary Schapiro, after serving on the staff in the Enforcement Division. Early in her career she was a litigator at large law firms including Jenner & Block, Snell & Wilmer, and Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, and served a federal judicial clerkship.

She has taught classes on securities regulation and the role of the SEC, cryptocurrency, and federal oversight at Georgetown University Law Center and the University of Virginia Law School.

Professor Goldsmith Romero holds a Juris Doctorate from Brigham Young University, and a Bachelor of Science from Old Dominion University.