Andrew Stoltmann

The Twenty-Two Million Dollars

In 2024, FINRA closed 1,852 customer arbitration cases. Most ended in settlement. Panels issued 232 awards, and customers received damages in sixty-one of them. Fifteen damages awards remained unpaid when FINRA last updated its data. Measured against every closed customer case, that was one percent. Measured against the cases in which a customer had actually won damages, it was one in four.

The dollar measure was sharper. Panels awarded about $59 million in those sixty-one cases; about $22 million, or thirty-seven percent, was unpaid. Eight of the unpaid matters were uncontested, and those eight accounted for roughly $16 million. A final decision had settled legal responsibility within the forum. It had not put the money in the customer’s account.

Stoltmann represents investors in arbitration and securities cases and has repeatedly addressed the collection process: who may represent an investor, whether a respondent is likely to pay, and what remedies remain when an award is unpaid.

What the Forum Promises

FINRA arbitration supplies a real adjudicative process. The parties choose independent arbitrators, the panel receives evidence, and its written award is final and binding within the forum. Judicial review remains available on narrow grounds. If no motion to vacate is pending, an industry respondent must pay within thirty days or risk an expedited suspension proceeding. FINRA can prevent a nonpaying firm or broker from remaining active in the brokerage industry.

The forum does not guarantee payment. FINRA states that collection belongs to the claimant, much as it would after a court judgment. The customer may seek confirmation and use judicial collection procedures. Bankruptcy can stay enforcement or discharge the obligation. An inactive firm or broker may have no registration left for FINRA to suspend and no assets sufficient to satisfy the award. FINRA now warns customers about inactive respondents and permits them, in defined circumstances, to withdraw from arbitration and proceed elsewhere.

FINRA emphasizes that unpaid awards represent a small share of all closed customer cases. It has strengthened suspension and membership rules and expanded customer options when a respondent becomes inactive. The same data show that unpaid awards accounted for about $22 million and thirty-seven percent of customer-award dollars in 2024.

A Lawyer Formed Inside the System

Stoltmann’s route to investor representation passed through the securities industry itself. After earning a business degree from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1994, he worked for two years as a financial adviser at Merrill Lynch. He then attended DePaul University College of Law and clerked in the Chicago office of the organization then known as NASD, FINRA’s predecessor. He received his J.D. in 1999.

His firm, founded in 2005, represents investors rather than brokerage firms. It reports that Stoltmann has handled more than 1,200 FINRA, AAA, and JAMS arbitrations, investment cases, and related complex matters. His docket includes brokerage accounts, advisers, securities products, digital assets, and claims that move among private forums and courts.

Stoltmann has taught securities law as an adjunct professor at Northwestern and served as president of the Public Investors Arbitration Bar Association in 2017–2018. PIABA’s records confirm that term. His experience includes work as a financial adviser, a clerk at FINRA’s predecessor, claimants’ counsel, and an adjunct professor.

The Recovery Pool

During his PIABA presidency, Stoltmann and Hugh Berkson authored a report urging a national recovery pool for unpaid investor awards. Their premise was direct: rules against misconduct do not accomplish their purpose when a successful claimant cannot recover. The report treated nonpayment as a second injury—one that follows the time, cost, and strain of proving the first.

The proposal went beyond individual debt collection. Stoltmann and Berkson argued for a pooled source of recovery when responsible firms or brokers could not pay. They examined funding and eligibility, reviewed unpaid-award data, and pressed FINRA, the SEC, and Congress to address failures the existing suspension system could not cure. FINRA has not adopted the proposal, and the report’s historical figures predate the regulator’s current data.

FINRA’s 2026 rule review records the principal objections to a recovery pool: it could charge firms that already honor awards, shift costs to investors, and create moral hazard. The review also identifies legal and boundary questions—whether FINRA could create a pool without SEC rulemaking or legislation, and why it would cover FINRA awards but not unpaid securities judgments in court or other private forums. The dispute concerns who should insure a respondent’s failure and under what authority.

In 2024, unpaid awards represented fifteen of 1,852 closed customer cases, but about $22 million and thirty-seven percent of all customer-award dollars. The figures measure different aspects of the same collection problem.

Where Collection Risk Concentrates

The 2024 figures also show why a simple average can mislead. The five largest unpaid awards accounted for about $20 million of the $22 million total; the three largest accounted for about $17 million. The median unpaid amount was $500,000, while the largest exceeded $13 million. A small number of failures can therefore dominate the dollar record even when most disputes settle and most damages awards are paid.

Inactive respondents remain a recurring complication, though not a complete explanation for the 2024 total. FINRA reports that two of the fifteen unpaid matters involved a firm already inactive when the claim was filed, five involved an individual then inactive, and eight were uncontested. The categories can overlap, and the table does not allocate every unpaid dollar among insolvency, nonappearance, or defenses to payment.

Claimants’ counsel must examine the status of each potential respondent, available insurance or capital, pre-award settlement options, and the forum’s enforcement reach before assessing the practical value of an award.

Who May Represent the Investor

Stoltmann’s institutional work has not been limited to collection. In 2017, he and David Neuman examined compensated non-lawyer representatives in FINRA arbitration. FINRA Rule 12208 permits a party to be represented by a person who is not an attorney when applicable law allows it, subject to stated restrictions. The authors argued that the rule exposed customers to representatives who might lack a lawyer’s licensing duties, disciplinary structure, and malpractice coverage.

The recommendation was categorical, with limited exceptions: FINRA should bar compensated non-lawyers from representing customers. PIABA’s proposal did not alter Rule 12208 or establish that every non-lawyer representative performs inadequately. It focused on the licensing, disciplinary, and malpractice-insurance obligations that apply before a panel reaches the merits.

The two reports address representation before and during arbitration and collection after an award remains unpaid.

The SIM-Swap Arbitration

A private American Arbitration Association proceeding extended Stoltmann’s work beyond conventional brokerage accounts. Stoltmann and Joe Wojciechowski represented a Texas customer who alleged that a fraudulent SIM swap led to the theft of cryptocurrency from a cold-storage wallet. According to the firm’s case report, T-Mobile sought dismissal before the hearing and defended the case over nearly four days, with expert testimony.

The firm reports that the arbitrator awarded $995,000: $750,000 in compensatory damages, $225,000 in attorney’s fees, and $20,000 in expenses. The matter proceeded under AAA consumer rules, not FINRA’s code. Because the private award is not publicly available, the amount and disposition are reported on the firm’s account.

The case proceeded in a forum selected by a telecommunications contract and asserted account-security claims under contract, negligence, and federal statutes. The arbitration proceeded under AAA consumer rules rather than FINRA’s code.

After the Panel Leaves

FINRA publishes awards, imposes payment deadlines, uses suspension proceedings, and gives customers more choice when a respondent is inactive. It also cautions that its awards database may not contain later court orders confirming, modifying, or vacating an award. Those proceedings can change the legal and financial history of the award.

Stoltmann has represented investors inside several forums, argued for standards governing who may represent them, and pressed for a collective answer when a final award cannot be paid. His recovery-pool proposal remains contested, but unpaid awards continue to leave some prevailing investors without the remedy the panel ordered.

A panel can decide liability, FINRA can suspend a nonpaying industry respondent, and a court can confirm the award. None of those steps guarantees collection from an insolvent or unavailable respondent. For a prevailing investor, the practical remedy depends on whether the award can be collected.