PayPal hired former District Attorney and American Express executive Aaron Karczmer to become its Senior Vice President, Chief Compliance Officer. Karczmer held a number of roles at the New York County District Attorney’s office including Assistant District Attorney and Unit Chief for the Identity Theft Unit before joining American Express in 2007.
Complying with laws and regulations is no laughing matter for a financial services company, as PayPal was reminded last year when it had to pay the US Treasury Department $7.7 million to settle alleged violations of economic sanctions.
At the time, then Chief Compliance Officer Gene Truono said the company recognized that prior to April 2013, PayPal did not have a system that could scan payments in real time in order to block prohibited payments. It’s not clear if Truono remains at PayPal. He had taken over from Leonard Shen, who was PayPal’s Chief Compliance Officer from 2010 to 2014 and is now CCO at Visa.
In announcing the appointment, PayPal CEO Dan Schulman said, “over the past year, we’ve significantly increased our investments in risk and compliance excellence across our organization.”
Karczmer will report directly to Schulman, who said in his announcement, “Aaron will play a key role in driving our ongoing commitment to continually strengthening PayPal’s compliance organization and capabilities. He will lead an accomplished team of compliance professionals who are dedicated to ensuring PayPal consistently acts as a Customer Champion.”
In related news, PayPal is ceasing operations in Turkey today (June 6th) after Turkish regulators there did not provide the company with a license to operate.
