_{Regulatory Innovator | Risk/Compliance Leader | Global Executive | Attorney/Trusted Counselor/Advisor}

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Kenneth A. Blanco (Ken) is a recognized industry leader and speaker in the areas of law, financial integrity and compliance, international governmental relations, and leadership/management dynamics. As an experienced trial attorney, regulator, and compliance officer, Ken has held senior leadership and managerial roles in both the private and public sectors while leading and managing large and diverse global organizations. Ken has served, worked with, and advised numerous U.S. Attorneys General and other Cabinet and Sub-Cabinet members of the United States government, including White House Officials, the National Security Council, the Secretary of the Treasury, as well as boards of directors and senior executives of various public and privately held companies. Ken has worked with, advised, and collaborated with Presidents, Vice Presidents, Supreme Court Justices, Ministers of Finance, and other high-ranking government officials and business leaders from around the world.  He has testified before Congress numerous times and has briefed congressional staffers on many occasions regarding important legal, regulatory, and financial issues and topics. He has held the highest security clearances in the U.S. government, and although no longer a government official Ken still holds a Top Secret SCI.  He has led teams, worked in, and served as a civilian in war zones and terrorist occupied areas on behalf of the United States government.

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Ken is a partner at Arktouros PLLC, an American law and advisory boutique specializing in risk management, emergent technology, and civil society. Prior to joining Arktouros, Ken served as the Chief Compliance Officer (CCO) for Citigroup’s Global Financial Crimes Program, and as a member of Citi’s Independent Compliance Risk Management (ICRM) Executive Management Team, where Ken led and managed a global organization of several thousand compliance professionals in 97 countries around the world.  In this role, Ken helped support and protect Citi, and the U.S. financial system, against financial crimes risks by overseeing the firm’s Anti-Money Laundering (AML), Global Financial Crimes Investigations and Intelligence, Sanctions, and Anti-Bribery & Corruption programs, across all lines of business, subsidiaries, and jurisdictions in which Citi operates. 

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Prior to joining Citi in April 2021, Ken served as the Director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), a Bureau within the U. S. Department of the Treasury, where he worked to combat domestic and international financial crime and enforce and promulgate regulations to protect the United States’ financial system and national security against money laundering and its related crimes, including terrorism financing.

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Prior to his appointment as FinCEN Director by the Secretary of the Treasury in 2017, Ken served as the Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division at the United States Department of Justice, and for 11 years as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Criminal Division.  In these roles, Ken led and was responsible for national and international criminal matters relating to U.S. law, including Bank Integrity, Fraud, FCPA, Money Laundering, Asset Forfeiture, Kleptocracy, and Public Corruption.

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After graduating from Georgetown University Law Center in 1989, Ken returned to his native Miami and began his career at the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office, where he served as a trial lawyer in various sections including the Organized Crime Section, Public Corruption Section, and the Major Narcotics Section.  In 1998, Ken joined the United States Attorney’s Office in the Southern District of Florida (Miami) as an Assistant United States Attorney, where he served in numerous leadership positions including Deputy Chief of Narcotics/Chief of the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, Acting Chief of Narcotics, and Deputy Chief of the Major Crimes Section.

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During his time at the United States Attorney’s Office, Ken was detailed to Washington, D.C. in 2002 for two years where he served as General Counsel to the 94 United States Attorney’s Offices and the Executive Office of United States Attorneys. In 2006, Ken returned to Washington, D.C. to serve as the Chief of the Narcotic and Dangerous Drug Section at the Department of Justice. He was later promoted to the position of Deputy Assistant Attorney General, where he supervised the Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Section, Organized Crime and Gang Section, Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Narcotic and Dangerous Drug Section, and matters relating to Afghanistan, Argentina, Colombia, Mexico, and Panama.