RBC Wealth Management is on the hook for nearly $10 million in an age and sex discrimination complaint brought by one of its former top-producing advisors.
A Financial Industry Regulatory Authority arbitration panel decided Thursday to award ex-RBC Wealth advisor Cinda Collins roughly $9.7 million in a case alleging the firm “wrongfully discriminated against her based upon her age and sex” and terminated her employment “because she was nearing retirement.” Collins’ complaint accused RBC of pushing her toward the exit in late 2019 so that it could “steal much of her book of business without compensating her for it.”
Collins was at RBC and its predecessor firm Dain Rauscher in the Minneapolis area for more than 25 years, starting in 1992. She is now a registered representative of Wells Fargo, according to FINRA’s BrokerCheck database.
She regularly appears on Forbes lists for top women advisors and top in-state advisors in Minnesota. Forbes credited her overseeing a team that oversaw $425 million in client assets before her departure from RBC.
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One of Collins’ lawyers, Joseph Anthony of the Minneapolis-based firm Anthony Ostlund Louwagie Dressen & Boylan, said RBC had fired Collins under false premises and did not follow its own policies when it terminated her employment.
“The evidence demonstrated that she was fired without reasonable notice of the allegations against her or a fair opportunity to respond,” Anthony said in an email.
A spokesperson for RBC Wealth Management said the firm was disappointed in the arbitration decision and disagrees with it.
“At RBC, we value diversity and inclusion, we do not tolerate unlawful discrimination, and we maintain a workplace culture where all employees are respected and treated fairly,” the spokesperson said.
Collins had initially sought $7 million in compensatory damages — the value she placed on her book of business — as well as punitive damages and compensation for legal costs. At the arbitration hearings, she lowered her monetary claim to $6.4 million.
In the end, the three-member arbitration panel that heard her claims awarded roughly $6 million in compensatory damages, $2 million in punitive damages and $1.5 million for various legal and other costs. The arbitrators, though, denied her request for changes to the regulatory Form U5 RBC filed when it let her go.
Brokerages are required to file a Form U5 any time one of their registered representatives leaves for any reason. Collins had sought to have hers modified to say she was terminated without cause.
Anthony said he thinks the $2 million in punitive damages were handed down because his client was able to show “clear and convincing evidence of a discriminatory pattern on the part of RBC.”
The award sends “a clear message to the financial services industry that ageist, sexist, defamatory and discriminatory practices are not going to continue to be business as usual in the financial services industry,” Anthony said. The arbitration panel said in its decision that its reward was granted in response to breaches of Minnesota laws banning unfair employment discrimination.
The brokerage industry has long had a reputation for being inhospitable to women and minority groups. Several other recent settlements and lawsuits show that concerns about unfair workplace treatment are never far away.
In May, Merrill agreed to pay nearly $20 million to settle discrimination charges brought by Black former employees. And Edward Jones is fighting a lawsuit filed in federal court St. Louis in 2022 by two ex-advisors who allege they suffered from discriminatory treatment at the firm.
Bill Singer, a securities lawyer and retired author of the Broke and Broker blog, noted the arbitration panel reached its decision only after 21 hearing sessions, going from May to September, and seven prehearing sessions, from March 2021 to March this year.
“For three independent arbitrators to need 21 hearing sessions to hear a ton of evidence is a pretty strong indication RBC behaved in a despicable and reprehensible manner,” he said. “Why do we know that? Because they awarded $2 million in punitive damages and $1 million in attorney fees.”
