Kara Stein

Kara Marlene Stein is an American attorney who currently serves as a board member of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, known as PCAOB. Stein was sworn in on November 18, 2021, with a term through October 24, 2026.

Stein also served on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) from August 2013 till January 2019. In May 2013, President Barack Obama nominated Stein to serve as a Democratic member of the Commission to succeed Elisse Walter. Stein was confirmed by the Senate and started tenure at the SEC in August 2013. During her tenure on the SEC (which was still evaluating its role in the 2008 financial crisis), Stein took strong positions to protect investors, from her early support of the Volcker Rule - which prevents banks with deposits insured by American taxpayers from making speculative trades on their own accounts - to her dissents to legal waivers granted to banks and other already-found-guilty corporate players.

Stein's written dissents won support afterwards from Senators Elizabeth Warren and Sherrod Brown, both of whom spoke and wrote at length about the potential damage to the US investor and the US economy from the waivers.

In 2021, Stein was mentioned as a potential candidate to lead the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC).