Gary DeWaal is senior counsel at Katten Muchin Rosenman, where he is the former chair of the financial markets and regulatory team. He has been a trailblazer for the firm’s cryptoassets and blockchain technology practice in addition to his long-standing work in traditional derivatives law. DeWaal's career began at Mudge Rose Guthrie & Alexander, and in 1982 he joined the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission's Division of Enforcement where he departed in 1986 as a senior trial attorney. DeWaal then joined Mocatta Futures as a compliance officer and was quickly promoted to general counsel and eventually served as head of operations and president. The majority of his career was spent as group general counsel of Fimat, later known as Newedge, where DeWaal oversaw the group’s legal, compliance, and anti-money laundering functions and was a member of the group’s global executive committee. While at Fimat, DeWaal also served multiple terms on FIA’s Law and Compliance Division’s Executive Committee. DeWaal left Newedge in 2013 and established his own consulting firm. There, he began publishing his popular weekly blog, Bridging the Week, which covered regulatory and legal developments in financial services industry, before ultimately joining Katten in 2014.
