Chris Pilkerton

Chris Pilkerton serves as the Chief Legal and Regulatory Strategy Officer for Accion Opportunity Fund, the nation’s largest nonprofit community development financial institution focused on supporting small business. Before joining AOF, Chris served as a White House Senior Policy Advisor and Executive Director of the WH Opportunity Now Initiative, as well as Acting Administrator and General Counsel of the US Small Business Administration. Prior to the SBA, he was a Compliance Director at  J.P. Morgan Chase, and was named one of the “Heroes of the Fortune 500” by Fortune Magazine, in recognition of his work with Liberian orphans. Chris has also been a financial services counsel, Manhattan Assistant District Attorney and Senior Counsel at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. He also serves in the U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary, is currently an Executive-In-Residence at Johns Hopkins University Business School, and has taught public policy, risk, and financial controls at the Catholic University of America School of Law. He was a Fulbright Teaching Scholar and received a Master's of Public Administration from Columbia University, a Juris Doctor from the Catholic University of America School of Law, a Bachelor of Arts from Fairfield University, and a Certificate in Data Analytics from Cornell University.