WilmerHale

Partner

Meredith Cross is a partner in the Securities and Transactional Departments in the New York and Washington DC offices of WilmerHale. Ms. Cross advises public companies and their boards on disclosure and other corporate finance securities law and corporate governance matters, including SEC enforcement matters involving corporate finance issues. Ms. Cross rejoined the firm in 2013, after having served as Director of the Division of Corporation Finance of the SEC since 2009.

While serving as the Director of the Division of Corporation Finance of the SEC, Ms. Cross led the Division's efforts to implement both the Dodd-Frank Act and the Jumpstart Our Business Startups (JOBS) Act. Under her leadership, the Division recommended close to 60 rulemaking releases to the Commission. Ms. Cross testified before Congress numerous times on a broad range of issues including corporate governance, capital formation, risk retention in asset-backed securities offerings, executive compensation oversight, and agency management and budget.

Before first joining WilmerHale in 1998, Ms. Cross served in a variety of positions in the Division of Corporation Finance at the SEC from 1990 to 1998, including Deputy Director, Associate Director (International and Small Business) and Chief Counsel. Prior to first joining the SEC staff, she was an associate and counsel at another large law firm in Atlanta from 1983–1990. She clerked for Judge Albert J. Henderson of the US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit (1982–1983).

Ms. Cross currently serves as Co-Chair of the Practicing Law Institute’s Annual Institute on Securities Regulation. She is a frequent speaker at securities and corporate governance law conferences. She is a member of the Steering Committee of the Securities Regulation Institute, a member of the Securities Institute Advisory Committee, a Fellow in the American College of Governance Counsel, and previously served as a member of the ABA Corporate Laws Committee. She is President-Elect and a member of the Board of Trustees of the SEC Historical Society and a member of the Board of Governors of the Wilmer Eye Institute at Johns Hopkins. Ms. Cross also serves as a member of the Advisory Board for the ESG Professionals Network.

JD, Vanderbilt University Law School, 1982 BA, Duke University, 1979