Robert Liu has a diverse practice representing domestic and international corporations and individuals on a wide variety of matters. His practice focuses on corporate, banking regulatory compliance, international trade, and commercial litigation. He has obtained trial victories for clients in corporate and employment matters.

Robert was born in China and studied finance at Tsinghua University in Beijing. He then went on to study at the Yale School of Management as a Silver Scholar, where he was one of the two dozen students selected university-wide in 2009 to take former British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s course “Faith and Globalization,” and was also a Teaching Assistant for a first-year core course in the MBA Program.

Robert started his career at Promontory Financial Group in Washington DC in 2010 and rose through the ranks to serve as Global Relationship Manager (the youngest one) for one of the top 10 largest banks in the world. In that capacity, he was responsible for coordinating the entire Firm’s service offerings to that bank on a global basis and Promontory soon became a trusted advisor to this global bank at all levels, including at the CEO’s level. He also led major corporate governance enhancement and regulatory enforcement remediation projects for several large banks in the U.S. and in Asia. Robert was a core member of the Secretariat for the Working Group on U.S. RMB Trading and Clearing, an effort led by former NYC mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, former SEC Chairwoman Mary Schapiro, former Treasury Secretaries Timothy F. Geithner and Henry M. Paulson, Jr. to promote the usage of RMB in the U.S. Such effort led to the designation of Bank of China New York Branch as the clearing and settlement bank for RMB in the United States, as announced by Chinese Premier Keqiang Li at the Waldorf Astoria in New York in September 2016. During his tenure at Promontory, Robert was the go-to expert on US banking regulation for all the seven Chinese banks with operations in the U.S. and was a frequent speaker and presenter to Boards of Directors and Senior Executives of the Big Four banks in China.

While working for Promontory Financial Group, Robert attended the evening program at Georgetown University Law Center from 2011 to 2015, including an ABA-approved summer program hosted by Peking University Law School in China in 2014. Robert’s educational background in business and law enables him to effectively analyze legal issues in the business context and to offer legal advice with a better understanding of business needs.

After Promontory Financial Group was acquired by IBM to become the foundation of Watson Financial Services, Robert led one of the first pilot projects to implement IBM’s cognitive computing solutions in a large bank based in New York City to improve its risk management and regulatory compliance capabilities using artificial intelligence.

Robert brought a unique blend of business acumen and legal acuteness to bear in his legal practice. Grounded in his extensive business education and experiences, Robert provides legal advice that is practical and effective, with appreciation and empathy for each client’s unique circumstances and operational challenges, to help clients win legally.

In 2021, represented employer in employee termination case through successful grant of summary judgment that ended the litigation.

• Banking and Financial Regulation
• Capital Markets
• Merger and Acquisition
• Anti-money Laundering and Financial Sanctions
• FinTech
• International Economic and Trade Law
• Corporate Governance
• Civil and Business Litigation
• Employment and Labor Law
• Bankruptcy Law
• Consumer Finance
• Aviation Law

JD, Georgetown University
MBA, Yale University
BS in Finance, Tsinghua University in Beijing

• The Supreme Court of the United States
• United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
• United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit
• United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
• United States District Court for the Southern District of New York
• United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York
• United States District Court for the District of Columbia
• United States District Court for the District of New Jersey
• The United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Jersey
• United States Court of International Trade
• New York
• Washington, DC
• Connecticut
• New Jersey
• Maryland
• State of Washington
• Alaska

August 2010 to February 2018: working for IBM Watson in New York City and Promontory Financial Group in Washington, DC, focusing on developing artificial intelligence-based solutions for the financial services industry to meet stringent legal and regulatory requirements, as well as advising large U.S. and international financial institutions on how to comply with US Treasury Department, Federal Reserve, the OCC and the SEC laws and regulations. While at IBM and Promontory, Robert’s clients include five out of the top ten largest banks in the world.

Thoughts on the US FinTech Regulatory Principle— “Responsible Innovation”, China Banking, Vol.1, 2019:40-43

Financial Regulatory Framework Reform: International Experiences and China’s Choice, The Chinese Banker, Vol. 3, 2016: 90-94

Suits by Foreigners in US Courts for Air Accidents Occurring Abroad—Forum Non Conveniens after the Cour de Cassation’s Decision, Annals of Air and Space Law: Vol. XL (2015)

Co-author, Re: Strengthening the resilience of the banking sector, Bank for International Settlements, 2010
http://www.bis.org/publ/bcbs165/gsgxalb.pdf

• February 2022
  Featured in
  
  These health care workers say they were fired after raising safety concerns.
  https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/health-care-workers-say-fired-raising-safety-concerns-rcna14710