Philip S. Khinda

• pkhinda@steptoe.com
• vCard
• Washington Office

Philip S. Khinda is a partner in Steptoe’s Washington office, and focuses on internal investigations as well as securities enforcement and corporate governance matters.  He is co-head of the firm’s SEC Enforcement practice, and a member of its white-collar criminal defense practice group.  He also serves as Chair of the Ethics and Investigations Subcommittee of the American Bar Association's Corporate Governance Committee.

Mr. Khinda regularly assists corporate boards and management in conducting internal investigations, and in addressing sensitive governance and financial issues, including in connection with related government investigations and securities litigation.  His leadership of the CalPERS Special Review, its fee recovery of over $200 million for the nation's largest state pension fund, and its March 2011 public report on pay-to-play and public corruption issues are recent representative efforts.

Mr. Khinda also represents and defends public companies and institutions, their officers and directors, regulated entities, and others in matters before the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Department of Justice, state prosecutors and other regulatory authorities.  He is well-known for the many government investigations and inquiries he has resolved for clients without any charges ever being filed, or any public disclosure of the government's interest ever being made.  Those clients have included a broad group of public companies, private equity firms, hedge funds, and investment advisers as well as corporate executives and public figures.  While Mr. Khinda has served as successor and settlement counsel for a variety of institutional and individual clients, no corporation or individual that he has represented from the outset of an investigation has ever been sued by the SEC or indicted.

Mr. Khinda has advised and represented individual, corporate, and board committee clients in connection with many of the most significant securities matters over the last 20 years, including publicly-disclosed government investigations and litigation involving Rite Aid, Enron, Adelphia, Global Crossing, AOL Time Warner, UBS and JPMorgan, among others, appearing before US and international securities regulators on their behalf.  Over the last five years, he has also assisted a series of pension fund and mutual fund boards and board committees that investigated matters underlying the highest-profile and most complex government investigations and actions ever to face the investment management community, including leading institutions in the mutual fund market timing matters, in the mutual fund marketing kickback matters, and in the current wave of pension fund pay-to-play and public corruption matters.  His work on two of those matters, later made public, is now reflected in business school case studies (“Doing the Right Thing” on the Bank One market timing matter, and a Columbia Business School study on CalPERS).

Earlier in his career, Mr. Khinda served as a staff attorney and senior counsel with the SEC’s Division of Enforcement, where he led a number of high-profile and sensitive investigations, including financial fraud, investment management, market manipulation, and insider trading matters.  He was previously an analyst and associate with Morgan Stanley & Company in New York.

For over a decade, Mr. Khinda has served as an Adjunct Professor of Law at Georgetown University, and has published and taught on financial reporting and accounting, corporate governance, crisis management, securities regulation, and SEC enforcement matters.  He is a frequent public speaker on these topics as well, and his work and legal commentary have been covered widely by the press, including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Financial Times, the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, Reuters, and Bloomberg, among others.  Active in international matters, and born in New York of Swiss and Indian descent, Mr. Khinda serves on the Financial Services Committee of the US-India Business Council.  He also serves as a member of the firm's Diversity Committee, and of its Multicultural Attorneys group.

Select News & Events

• Law360 Features Philip Khinda for Practice Leaders Q&A
• “SEC and Other Investigations Regarding Hedge Funds, Asset Managers and Other Investment Entities,” Securities Enforcement Forum 2012, October 18, 2012
• Philip Khinda Discusses Knight Capital Crisis, Market Stability on CNBC-TV
• Philip Khinda Discusses SEC Enforcement, Budget on CNBC-TV’s 'Closing Bell'
• Philip Khinda Appears on CNBC-TV’s 'Closing Bell' to Discuss SEC Funding
• The Huffington Post Quotes Steptoe’s Philip Khinda on SEC Trading and Market Oversight
• Philip Khinda Quoted by Main Justice on Public Corruption and FCPA Enforcement
• "Internal Investigations and Board Committee Reviews: Dealing with Difficult Matters in Difficult Times," Moderator of Panel, ABA Annual Meeting, Chicago (July 2009)
• "Citigroup and Countrywide: Their expected effects in the Boardroom and the Courtroom," ABA Webcast (June 2009)
• "Corporate Governance and Board Oversight" at "The Indian Opportunity," a US-India Business Council/FWA event, New York (May 2009)
• Co-Chair, Executive Enterprise Institute Annual SEC Enforcement Conference, Moderator of SEC Enforcement Staff Panel and presenter on Corporate Governance (Chicago, June 2007 and New York, May 2007)
• "Regulatory Challenges Facing the Investment Management Community," Investment Company Institute Annual Conference, Palm Desert, California (March 2007)

Selected Publications

• The Longer Arm of the Law in New York
  October 28, 2011, Securities Docket
• FCPA Year in Review 2010
  March 15, 2011
• The Rise and Rise of the NYAG
  May 2010, Securities Docket
• International Law Advisory - Flurry of FCPA Cases Closes Out 2009; Enforcement Continues Apace in Early 2010
  March 16, 2010
• Private Investor Frederic Bourke Sentenced to Prison and $1 Million Fine
  November 16, 2009, International Law Advisory
• International Law Advisory - SEC Adopts Several Expansive Applications of the Federal Securities Laws in the Recent FCPA Enforcement Action Against Nature’s Sunshine and Two Senior Executives
  September 8, 2009
• International Law Advisory - Private Investor Convicted for Involvement in Scheme to Bribe Officials in the Republic of Azerbaijan
  July 22, 2009
• The Nuances of Securities Reform
  March 30, 2009, New York Law Journal

More Publications »

Professional Affiliations

• Chair, Ethics and Investigations Subcommittee, American Bar Association's Corporate Governance Committee