Mr. James F. McGowan

CFP Board makes available information that a CFP® professional has provided about his or her practice. CFP Board also provides information about any CFP® professional that CFP Board has publicly disciplined or any professional who made a bankruptcy disclosure to CFP Board (more details about bankruptcy below). We cannot guarantee the information the CFP® professional has provided is accurate or complete. You should verify the accuracy of the information yourself.

While the information on this website may be useful to you, there may be more information from other sources you will need or want. Provided below are links to other sources of information about CFP® professionals that may be more recent or that may contain information that has not led to CFP Board discipline and does not appear on CFP Board’s website. The information may include customer disputes, disciplinary actions taken by a regulator or employer, certain criminal matters, and certain financial matters (such as bankruptcy proceedings and unpaid judgments or liens). The links provided below may provide additional information only if the CFP® professional is subject to the oversight of that regulator or SRO. If the CFP® professional is not subject to their oversight, then the link will not provide access to any additional information about that person.

• You can find information about CFP® professionals who are subject to Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) or Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) oversight through FINRA’s BrokerCheck and the SEC’s Investment Adviser Public Disclosure databases. Both are free tools you can use to conduct research.
• Visit your state securities regulator’s website for more information about brokers and investment advisers and your state insurance department website for more information about insurance professionals.
• Visit the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) website to search for enforcement actions against individuals who are subject to OCC oversight.
• Conduct an Internet search on the CFP® professional’s name (and business name).

Effective June 30, 2020, CFP Board may publicly sanction a CFP® professional for a personal or business bankruptcy that violates CFP Board’s Code of Ethics and Standards of Conduct. (There is no violation if the CFP® professional can make a case that the bankruptcy does not reflect on the professional’s ability to responsibly manage his or her own financial affairs or the financial affairs of the business.) You can find public sanctions in the “CFP Board Public Disciplinary History.” Under the “Prior Bankruptcy Disclosure Procedures” that applied from July 2012 – June 2020, CFP Board published information about a CFP® professional’s verified single bankruptcy in a press release and on CFP Board’s website. These were disclosures, not discipline or sanctions, and remain on CFP Board’s website for 10 years. You may learn more about the disclosure procedures here. You can learn more information about a bankruptcy filing at the U.S. Court’s website. You will be required to register and pay a nominal fee to view the information on that website.