Financial Literacy for All

ATLANTA – September 27, 2022 – Operation HOPE, Inc., the nation’s largest non-profit dedicated to financial empowerment for underserved communities, today announced that Eric Kaplan will be joining its Senior Leadership team as EVP, President of Financial Literacy for All (FL4A).

Kaplan brings to the FL4A mission a three-decade career focusing on housing and consumer finance, policy, and advocacy. Kaplan joins FL4A from the nonprofit, nonpartisan Milken Institute, where he leveraged 25 years of experience in banking and law to lead the think tank’s housing finance program as director and senior advisor. In this role, Kaplan engaged and advised a wide range of government, private sector, and nonprofit stakeholders in the pursuit of a well-functioning, equitable, and inclusive housing finance system. Today, he continues in his capacity as a senior advisor to the Milken Institute Center for Financial Markets.

“Eric is joining a team of leaders and change makers who are committed to the mission of Financial Literacy for All. His diverse industry experience will help us connect with new partners and communities to expand our reach, ” said Operation HOPE Chairman, Founder, and CEO John Hope Bryant. “We are excited to have Eric join the Operation HOPE team and look forward to building together.”

From 2019-2021, Kaplan served a two-year appointed term on the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s Consumer Advisory Board, serving as board chair in his second year. In this role, he helped advise the CFPB on important issues and trends affecting American consumers and consumer financial markets – particularly significant throughout the height of the pandemic. Coming out of the Financial Crisis, Kaplan worked to facilitate the re-emergence of private capital as a safe and accessible source of home financing, spearheading and chairing the nation’s leading residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) reform effort and co-chairing a U.S. Treasury Department RMBS reform working group.

“Eric has years of experience highlighting the need for financial literacy and empowering underserved families in the face of systemic challenges and complex markets and rules,” said Brian Betts, Operation HOPE President and Chief Financial Officer. “His work aligns with the Financial Literacy For All Mission, and with his leadership this initiative will be able to break the barriers that keep so many Americans from accessing the knowledge and resources they need to participate in the American economy.”

Kaplan also serves as an independent board member of Kroll Bond Rating Agency, LLC, a board member of the Cameron Kravitt Foundation, and as chair of the Fixed Income Investor Network RMBS Task Force. He is a member of the Senior Advisory Board of the Mortgage Industry Standards Maintenance Organization (MISMO), having previously served on the organization’s board. Kaplan has also served on the board and co-chaired the residential mortgage committee of the Structured Finance Association. Additionally, he has advised a number of mortgage and consumer finance, technology, and nonprofit organizations across a wide range of initiatives and issues.

Kaplan holds an A.B. in politics from Princeton University and a J.D. from Boston University School of Law. He has been admitted to practice law in NY, NJ, and the U.S. District Court, and he also held FINRA Series 7, 63, and 79 licenses and a SAFE Act Mortgage Loan Originator license.

Financial Literacy for All is a national initiative to support embedding financial literacy into American culture. Launched May 20, 2021, the 10-year commitment Co-Chaired by Walmart CEO Doug McMillion and Operation HOPE Founder, Chairman and CEO John Hope Bryant, will reach millions of youth and working adults enabling them to achieve greater financial success for themselves and their families.

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About Operation HOPE, Inc.

Since 1992, Operation HOPE has been moving America from civil rights to “silver rights” with the mission of making free enterprise and capitalism work for the underserved—disrupting poverty for millions of low and moderate-income youth and adults across the nation. Through its community uplift model, HOPE Inside, which received the 2016 Innovator of the Year recognition by American Banker magazine, Operation HOPE has served more than 4 million individuals and directed more than $3.2 billion in economic activity into disenfranchised communities—turning check-cashing customers into banking customers, renters into homeowners, small business dreamers into small business owners, minimum wage workers into living wage consumers, and uncertain disaster victims into financially empowered disaster survivors. Operation HOPE recently received its eighth consecutive 4-star charity rating for fiscal management and commitment to transparency and accountability by the prestigious non-profit evaluator, Charity Navigator. For more information: OperationHOPE.org. Join the conversation on social media at @operationhope.

Media Contact

Lalohni Campbell for Operation HOPEla@persemediagroup.com