FINRA Suspends Christine Cantone in Principal and Supervisory Capacities for Failure to Supervise Private Placement Fraud

If you are a current or former client of Christine Louise Cantone or invested through Cantone Research Inc. in any private placement offering — particularly the Cherokee Offering or any other investment involving certificates of participation — you should know that according to BrokerCheck, FINRA has suspended Cantone in her principal and supervisory capacities, and according to the NAC decision, the suspension followed findings that she failed to supervise the firm’s president and allowed material omissions to reach 53 investors who collectively invested more than $1.8 million.

According to BrokerCheck, Christine Louise Cantone (CRD# 2687618) was registered with Cantone Research Inc. (CRD# 26314) in Eatontown, New Jersey, from May 1996 through September 2023. According to BrokerCheck, Cantone is not currently registered with any FINRA member firm. According to BrokerCheck, her BrokerCheck record reflects three regulatory events, one civil event, and two customer disputes.

What FINRA Found

Following contested proceedings spanning more than a decade — from a 2015 FINRA complaint through a hearing panel decision, two NAC decisions, and an SEC appeal — the NAC on remand issued a final decision on January 23, 2026, finding that Christine Cantone failed to reasonably supervise the president and majority owner of Cantone Research Inc. in violation of NASD Rule 3010(a) and FINRA Rule 2010.

According to BrokerCheck, Christine Cantone served as Vice President of Cantone Research Inc. According to the NAC decision, she also served as the firm’s Chief Compliance Officer and was responsible for supervising its president, Anthony Cantone, in connection with his activities related to the firm’s private placement offerings.

According to the NAC decision, Christine Cantone was aware that the central real estate developer involved in the firm’s offerings was failing to make timely interest payments relating to multiple offerings, and that she and the firm were covering those missed payments — some of them from her joint account with Anthony Cantone. According to the NAC decision, she knew when the developer needed extensions to repay principal and was privy to discussions about the structure of the Cherokee Offering, including the decision to include a guaranty from one entity rather than the developer himself.

According to the NAC decision, despite all these red flags, Christine Cantone admitted that she took no steps to address them.

According to the NAC decision, her supervisory failure was serious: it affected dozens of transactions, as she did not require the firm’s president and Cantone Research Inc. to disclose material facts to the 53 investors who collectively invested more than $1.8 million in the Cherokee Offering. According to the NAC decision, Christine Cantone acted at least recklessly, as she was aware of red flags demonstrating the key participant’s inability or refusal to honor his obligations in earlier projects, yet ignored those red flags as the firm’s president and Cantone Research Inc. failed to disclose material facts to Cherokee investors.

According to the NAC decision, Christine Cantone has never acknowledged, much less accepted responsibility for, her misconduct.

Prior Regulatory History, Civil Judgment, and Customer Disputes

Cantone’s BrokerCheck record reflects a pattern of supervisory failures dating back more than fifteen years — including a prior FINRA suspension, a state securities regulator enforcement action, a civil court judgment for restitution and fines, and two settled customer disputes.

Prior 2012 FINRA Principal Suspension

According to BrokerCheck, FINRA found that Cantone, as Vice President and Chief Compliance Officer of her member firm, failed to reasonably supervise a registered representative at the firm throughout that representative’s association with the firm. According to BrokerCheck, Cantone was aware of certain red flags that should have alerted her to misconduct but failed to follow up on those indications of possible misconduct, and as a result, the registered representative was able to continue engaging in a scheme through which he sold fictitious investments to firm customers and misappropriated over $1.6 million of their funds. According to BrokerCheck, without admitting or denying the allegations, Cantone consented to the described sanctions. According to BrokerCheck, she was suspended from association with any FINRA member in a principal capacity for three months, running from March 19, 2012, through June 18, 2012, fined $10,000 jointly and severally with Cantone Research Inc., and ordered to pay $200,000 in partial restitution to customers jointly and severally with Cantone Research Inc.

New Jersey Bureau of Securities Suspension

According to BrokerCheck, the New Jersey Bureau of Securities initiated a regulatory action against Cantone on November 20, 2015 (Docket No. BOS20083-15), alleging dishonest or unethical practices by failing to reasonably supervise the sale of unregistered securities through the firm’s private placement offerings. According to BrokerCheck, the matter resolved through an administrative consent order that imposed a 19-month suspension running from November 20, 2015, through June 13, 2017.

New Jersey Superior Court Civil Judgment

According to BrokerCheck, the New Jersey Bureau of Securities also initiated a civil action in the NJ Superior Court, Essex County (Docket No. ESX-C-252-15), alleging violations of New Jersey securities law in connection with the sale of a private offering. According to BrokerCheck, the matter resolved by consent order and final judgment, under which Cantone individually was ordered to pay $1,800,000 in restitution and a $600,000 fine.

Customer Disputes

According to BrokerCheck, a customer complaint was received on January 28, 2019, alleging that a customer trust’s settlor had in 2011 purchased through Cantone an investment — a certificate of participation in an underlying third-party promissory note — that went into default in 2015, and that Christine Cantone had supervised the transaction. According to BrokerCheck, the alleged damages were $67,500 and the matter settled on February 14, 2019, for $42,500, with no individual monetary contribution from Cantone.

According to BrokerCheck, a FINRA arbitration (Docket No. 10-02349) was filed on June 12, 2010, alleging failure to supervise, breach of fiduciary duty, and negligence in connection with a registered representative who converted customer funds to his own use, with alleged damages of $1,300,000 plus alleged punitive damages in excess of $2 million. According to BrokerCheck, the matter settled on December 17, 2013, for a total of $800,000, consisting of $300,000 from the firm and $500,000 paid directly through the firm’s fidelity bond, with no individual monetary contribution from Cantone.

A settlement isn’t an admission of wrongdoing. FINRA is clear on that, and so are we. Firms and brokers settle disputes for all kinds of reasons: litigation costs, customer relationships, business optics. We’re not saying the settlement proves anything. What we are saying is that the record exists, it’s public, and if you had a similar experience with Christine Louise Cantone, you deserve to know about it.

What the Rules Require

NASD Rule 3010(a) required member firms to establish and maintain a system reasonably designed to supervise the activities of registered representatives. When a firm designates an individual as responsible for supervising particular personnel, that individual is personally obligated to implement and enforce that supervisory system — and to act when red flags appear. Passive oversight is not enough. A supervisor who becomes aware that a key participant in the firm’s offerings is missing payments, seeking extensions, and unable to meet financial commitments in earlier deals has an affirmative obligation to investigate and to ensure that investors receive accurate and complete disclosures before committing funds. Failure to act in the face of those warnings is itself a violation, independent of the underlying misconduct.

FINRA Rule 2010 requires member firms and associated persons to observe high standards of commercial honor and just and equitable principles of trade. A supervisory failure that allows material omissions to reach investors violates Rule 2010 independently, particularly when the supervisor possessed the knowledge needed to prevent the harm and chose not to act on it.

Private placement offerings carry elevated supervision obligations precisely because they are not registered with the SEC and do not receive the same disclosure scrutiny as public offerings. When a CCO knows that a central figure in those offerings is struggling to meet payment obligations from earlier deals, the obligation to ensure complete investor disclosure is heightened, not reduced.

FINRA Rule 12206 governs eligibility for arbitration claims. Investors considering a claim should consult with a securities arbitration attorney to evaluate whether their situation falls within the applicable timeframe.

Red Flags to Watch For

If you invested through Cantone Research Inc. in a certificate of participation, a promissory note, or any private placement offering, and were not told about payment difficulties, extension requests, or financial problems involving the developers or issuers behind those offerings, those are warning signs that material information may have been withheld. Other red flags include:

• You were not informed that earlier investors in similar offerings had experienced late payments or principal extensions from the same real estate developer
• The investment was presented as a straightforward real estate-backed opportunity without disclosure of problems in prior offerings
• You received notice of payment timing changes without explanation of the underlying financial difficulties
• The investment was not held through a standard brokerage account subject to regular supervision and reporting

If any of these patterns apply to your investment, a free consultation with a securities law attorney can help you understand whether you have a potential claim for damages.

Sanctions

According to BrokerCheck, Christine Cantone was suspended from association with any FINRA member in her principal and supervisory capacities for one year. According to BrokerCheck, the suspension runs from April 6, 2026, through April 6, 2027. According to BrokerCheck, Cantone and Cantone Research Inc. were also fined $40,000 jointly and severally.

According to the NAC decision, the NAC found that Cantone’s prior, shorter suspension for failing to supervise was inadequate — a conclusion the record amply supports, given that her first principal suspension in 2012 for the same type of supervisory failure did not prevent the conduct at issue in this case. The NAC noted that Cantone is a recidivist and that she has never acknowledged responsibility for her misconduct. According to the NAC decision, the sanctions were also informed by the scale of the supervisory failure and the firm’s prior disciplinary history.

Steps to Take Right Now

1. Gather your account statements, trade confirmations, and any correspondence with your broker or firm, including emails, texts, and written materials about the investments.
2. Look up your broker on FINRA BrokerCheck at brokercheck.finra.org to review their full disclosure record.
3. Contact a securities arbitration attorney for a consultation to evaluate your options.

Rosenberger + Kawabata represents retail investors in FINRA arbitration proceedings involving unsuitable private placement recommendations and failure to supervise. Contact Rosenberger + Kawabata online for a free and confidential consultation, or call (310) 894-6921.

The information in this post comes from FINRA’s public records and BrokerCheck database. You can view the full detailed report (CRD# 2687618) here.

You can view the full April 2026 FINRA disciplinary actions report here.