Bruce is senior counsel in the firm’s Corporate Transactions & Securities practice. He concentrates on a broad range of investment management matters including counseling on compliance under federal laws including ERISA, the Investment Advisers Act and the Internal Revenue Code.
Prior to joining Thompson Hine, Bruce served for nearly 20 years as Vice President and General Counsel for Verizon Investment Management Corp. (VIMCO), a registered investment adviser subsidiary of Verizon Communications Inc. that manages the assets of the funded Verizon employee benefit trusts, including pension, savings and VEBA trusts, the Verizon Foundation and the Verizon captive insurance company. VIMCO has in excess of $40 billion under management.
In this role, Bruce counseled and represented VIMCO in all aspects of its investment management business. He facilitated a wide variety of employee benefit trust and plan transactions, including a $7.5 billion liability transfer in 2012 between the Verizon Management Pension Plan and Prudential Insurance Company of America, some of the largest private pension trust mergers in U.S. history, the creation of target date funds for the Verizon management savings plans, the creation of investment partnerships to permit the Verizon VEBA trusts to invest their assets in common and the spin-off of portions of the Verizon pension and savings plans in connection with the disposition of Verizon business units.
Bruce also served as VIMCO’s Chief Compliance Officer. In this capacity, he drafted and implemented the company’s compliance program and code of conduct, reviewed VIMCO’s operating procedures and served as its primary contact for SEC audits and sweeps.
In addition, he was Assistant General Counsel Investment Management in Verizon Communications’ legal department, where he advised Verizon and its portfolio companies on plan sponsor issues.
Prior to joining VIMCO, Bruce worked for over 20 years in the financial services industry, handling a wide variety of ERISA, employment law, financial services and general corporate law matters.
