Andrew Calamari

Andrew Calamari, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's outgoing New York regional director, won't become the latest government official to trade his post for a perch at a large international law firm. Instead, starting Jan. 15, Calamari will be a partner at 55-attorney Finn Dixon & Herling, a law firm in Stamford, Connecticut, that advises financial services firms in regulatory, corporate and litigation matters.

Before joining the SEC in 2000, Calamari ran his own law firm for a few years and was previously a litigation partner at Donovan Leisure Newton & Irvine, an old-line New York law firm with about 30 partners that dissolved in 1998.

“I started out back in the old era of law firms,” Calamari said. “We were not businesspeople. Your main objective was the law and to serve the clients.”