New York Financial Services Regulator Harris to Depart

New York Governor Kathy Hochul announced that Superintendent Adrienne Harris will be leaving the Department of Financial Services (DFS).

Hochul is appointing Kaitlin Asrow as acting superintendent of DFS effective October 18, 2025.

“I’d like to thank Superintendent Harris for her four years of service at DFS, working every day to make our financial system work for New Yorkers, while also rebuilding the Department into a regulator fit for the financial capital of the world,” Hochul said.

Harris was nominated by Hochul to lead DFS in August 2021. Since then, DFS has, among other steps, issued guardrails around the use of artificial intelligence in insurance underwriting and pricing; required insurers to cover insulin without cost sharing; adopted market conduct rules to govern pharmacy benefit managers and began examining these entities; expanded banking development districts; and built the first virtual currency unit for the regulation and supervision of digital assets.

DFS reports it has recovered more than $725 million in restitution for New Yorkers since 2021.

Nationally, Harris became the state’s representative on the U.S. Financial Stability Oversight Council.

During her tenure, DFS issued 102 regulatory guidance letters; and adopted or amended 57 banking, insurance, and financial services regulations, including regulations on check-cashing fees and cybersecurity.

Harris began her career as an attorney with Sullivan & Cromwell LLP in New York representing corporations in various forms of litigation and regulatory matters, before accepting a position at the U.S. Department of the Treasury under President Barack Obama. While at the Treasury Department, her work included financial reform efforts, the student loan crisis, the nexus between foreign investment and national security, and promoting financial inclusion and health throughout the country.

Backgrounds

Harris later joined the White House, as part of the National Economic Council. In this role, she managed the financial services portfolio, which included developing strategies for financial reform and the implementation of the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, as well as consumer protections, cybersecurity, and housing finance reform priorities.

After leaving the White House in January 2017, Harris served as general counsel at insurance start-up DOMA. She also served as a professor at the University of Michigan, as well as a senior advisor at the Brunswick Group.

Asrow has worked at DFS for the past four years as executive deputy superintendent of the Research & Innovation division. In that role, she oversaw the regulation of virtual currency companies, building what DFS says is one of the largest virtual currency regulatory teams in the world. She is also responsible for the DFS policy work around innovation and financial inclusion. Asrow has helped lead the department’s continuing investment in technological infrastructure and key processes.

Asrow came to DFS from the Federal Reserve System, where she served as a senior policy advisor for both the Bank of San Francisco and the Board of Governors. During her tenure with the Federal Reserve, she served as a coordinator on innovation policy among the 12 district banks, as well as between the Federal Reserve, the Office of the Comptroller of Currency, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Crop.

Prior to the Federal Reserve, Asrow worked for the Center for Financial Services Innovation, now the Financial Health Network, which supports consumer financial health.

Asrow graduated from Stanford University with a Bachelor of Arts degree and subsequently earned her Master of Public Policy degree from the University of Chicago.

DFS was established in 2011 when the state merged the former departments of insurance and banking. DFS regulates more than 3,000 financial institutions with nearly $10 trillion in assets. This includes over 1,900 insurance companies with assets of more than $6.4 trillion and more than 1,300 banks and financial institutions with assets totaling more than $3.3 trillion. The department has 1,390 staff and a budget of $360,811,000.

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