Paul M. Aguggia

Paul M. Aguggia is a corporate attorney in Holland & Knight's Washington, D.C., office. Mr. Aguggia possesses particular experience in advising boards of directors and senior management with respect to mergers and acquisitions, capital raising and corporate governance matters. He has counseled financial institutions and portfolio companies throughout the United States for more than 35 years, including banks, FinTechs, private credit firms, investments banks, private equity funds and hedge funds, and has extensive experience interacting with federal and state banking and securities regulators.

Mr. Aguggia served as the chairman of the board, president and CEO of Clifton Bancorp Inc. (CSBK) from January 2014 until CSBK's merger with Kearny Financial Corp., for which he served on the board of directors until October 2018. Mr. Aguggia led the CSBK team's successful efforts to become a fully public company and to grow and transform the bank's balance sheet. Mr. Aguggia also was a member of the board of directors of Square 1 Bank, a financial institution serving entrepreneurs and the venture capital community. In 2005, he led the legal team in the formation of the bank, which at the time conducted one of the largest capital raises by a banking institution. Mr. Aguggia's experience as an executive and director of both a publicly and privately held company gives him significant insight into a broad array of legal, governance, regulatory and strategic issues.

Mr. Aguggia also previously served as chairman of an international law firm. In addition to leading a complex, worldwide organization, he continued to practice corporate and financial institutions law.

During law school, Mr. Aguggia served as editor-in-chief of the Alaska Law Review, a journal published by the Duke University School of Law since 1984 and underwritten by the Alaska Bar Association. Mr. Aguggia completed executive leadership programs at Harvard Business School and the University of Virginia Darden School of Business. In 2015, he was invited by Darden to be an instructor in its Bank Financial Leadership program.

Mr. Aguggia has spoken and written extensively on banking and corporate matters.