ICI Names David W. Blass General Counsel

Washington, DC, July 11, 2014—The Investment Company Institute has named David W. Blass as its General Counsel.

Blass is currently chief counsel and associate director of the Division of Trading and Markets at the Securities and Exchange Commission, where he oversees the division’s international program and provides legal and policy advice to the SEC chair and commissioners on a wide range of issues. He will report to ICI President and CEO Paul Schott Stevens when he joins the Institute in September.

“David brings to ICI a wealth of professional experience, gained in senior government service and in private practice both here and abroad,” Stevens said. “I am certain he will provide outstanding leadership as head of the Institute’s Law Department and as a member of our senior management team.”

As General Counsel, Blass will be the Institute’s chief legal officer, with responsibility for the full range of legal and regulatory matters affecting ICI and its members, including investment company, capital markets, pension, tax, and international issues.

Blass has served at the SEC twice: from 2003 to 2008, in the divisions of Trading and Markets and Investment Management, and since 2010, as associate general counsel and then chief counsel in Trading and Markets. In private practice, he served as special counsel to the asset management group at Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP from 2008 to 2010. He began his legal career at Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP in New York, Frankfurt, and London.

A graduate of the University of Alabama, Blass holds a JD from the Columbia University School of Law.