Privacy Policy

Cota St. Investment Management/Pensionmark Financial Group, LLC and Pensionmark Securities, LLC (collectively, “Pensionmark”) recognizes that its Clients have an expectation that Pensionmark and its affiliates will maintain the confidentiality of Clients’ nonpublic personal information.  Consequently, Pensionmark has adopted this Privacy Policy concerning information obtained during the servicing of Client’s account(s).

Nonpublic Information: Nonpublic information obtained by Pensionmark for purposes of providing services hereunder will not be furnished to third parties for any other purpose other than in furtherance of the services to be provided hereunder.  Notwithstanding the foregoing, Pensionmark may disclose nonpublic information (i) to the extent such disclosure is required by court order or by a valid order of a governmental body governmental or quasi-governmental agency (such as FINRA) (ii) after the time of disclosure such information becomes part of the public knowledge or literature, not as a result of any inaction or action of Pensionmark, (iii) reasonably necessary for Pensionmark to enforce its legal rights in any dispute with that Client; or (iv) is approved by Client, in writing, for release. Pensionmark does not disclose nonpublic personal information about its Clients to any party except as permitted by law.

Sources of Personal Information:  We collect Personal Information about you from meetings with you and on applications or other forms you have submitted to Pensionmark, as well as information about your investments or transactions with us or others (such as third-party service providers or fund companies) from other sources.

How Pensionmark Protects the Confidentiality of Clients’ Nonpublic Personal Information:  Pensionmark does not sell or trade Clients’ information with nonaffiliated companies.  When information is provided to third party service providers, safeguards are in place to assure that information is used only for the purpose it is provided.  Pensionmark maintains its records on secured computers.  Prospective employees are screened for criminal convictions.  Once hired, employees are made aware of Pensionmark’s Privacy Policy and of the confidential nature of the information they handle.  Employees are limited to accessing only that customer information that is necessary to perform their job functions.

To Whom This Policy Applies:  This Notice applies to all our Clients who enter into an Advisory Services Agreement or Customer Agreement with us. Our Former Clients:  Even if you are no longer a Client, our Privacy Policy will continue to apply to you.

Internet Cookies:  An internet “cookie” is a small amount of data that is placed on to your electronic device by a website and stored in your internet browser. Cookies allow websites to store things like preferences, so that it can recognize you when you come back and respond appropriately. When individuals access the Pensionmark.com website, Pensionmark makes use of cookies to improve the load times and functionality of the website, and in some cases registration pages. Pensionmark may from time to time also utilize data tracking software to assist us in spotting trends, and areas of improvement in the website. By accessing the Pensionmark.com site and embedded web pages, you are providing your express approval allowing us to utilize these technologies so that we can improve our service to you. Pensionmark may also use various third-party cookies to report usage statistics of the service, or to authenticate users and prevent fraudulent access of user accounts.

Access to and Correction of Information:  Upon the written request of Clients, we will make available for their review any file we may maintain for their personal Information; provided, however, that any Information collected in connection with, or in anticipation of, any claim or legal proceeding will not be made available.  If Clients notify us that any Information is incorrect, we will review it.  If we agree, we will correct our records.  If we do not agree, Clients may submit a short statement of dispute, which we will include in any future disclosure of the disputed Information.

Additional California Privacy Disclosures:  Please consult our supplemental Pensionmark Privacy Notice for California Residents for additional disclosures pertinent to California residents. 

Further Information:  We reserve the right to change this Privacy Policy at any time.  The examples contained within this Privacy Policy are illustrations and are not intended to be exclusive.  This Policy attempts to comply with federal and state regulations regarding privacy. Clients may have additional rights under other foreign or domestic laws that may apply to them.

If the financial advisor servicing a client account leaves Pensionmark to join another firm, the advisor is permitted to retain copies of client information so that he/she can assist with the transfer of the client account and continue to serve the client at their new firm.

“Opting-Out” of Third-Party Disclosures:  If a client does not want a financial advisor to retain copies of client sensitive information when he/she leaves Pensionmark to join another firm, the client may contact the Pensionmark Compliance Department by calling (888) 201-5488 or send an email to jennifer.tanck@pensionmark.com to request further information regarding this policy.

Pensionmark Financial Group, LLC Privacy Notice for California Residents

Effective Date:  January 1, 2020

Last Reviewed:  December 31, 2019

This Privacy Notice for California Residents supplements the information contained in Pensionmark’s Privacy Policy and applies solely to all clients, prospects, visitors, users and others who reside in the State of California (“consumers” or “you”).  Pensionmark adopts this notice to comply with the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (“CCPA”) and any capitalized terms not otherwise defined herein and defined in the CCPA have the same meaning when used in this Notice.   

This Notice does not apply to employment-related personal information collected from California-based employees, job applicants, contractors, or similar individuals.

Where expressly provided in this Notice, the CCPA temporarily exempts personal information reflecting a written or verbal business-to-business communication (“B2B personal information”) from some of its requirements.

Information We Collect:  We may collect information that identifies, relates to, describes, references, is reasonably capable of being associated with, or could reasonably be linked, directly or indirectly, with a particular consumer, household, or device (“personal information”). Personal information does not include:

• Publicly available information from government records.
• De-identified or aggregated consumer information.

Information excluded from the CCPA’s scope, such as:

• Health or medical information covered by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) and the California Confidentiality of Medical Information Act (CMIA) or clinical trial data;
• Personal information covered by certain sector-specific privacy laws, including the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) or California Financial Information Privacy Act (FIPA), and the Driver’s Privacy Protection Act of 1994.

In particular, we have collected the following categories of personal information from our consumers within the last twelve (12) months:

We obtain the categories of personal information listed above from the following categories of sources:

• Directly from you. For example, from forms you complete or products and services you purchase.
• Indirectly from you. For example, from observing your actions on our Website.
• Internet cookies
• Data brokers/resellers
• Social Media services
• Government databases

Use of Personal Information:  We may use or disclose the personal information we collect for one or more of the following purposes:

• To fulfill or meet the reason you provided the information. For example, if you share your name and contact information to request a price quote or ask a question about our products or services, we will use that personal information to respond to your inquiry. If you provide your personal information as a prospective client, we will use that information to process your payment and facilitate delivery of our services.
• To provide, support, personalize, and develop our Website, products, and services.
• To create, maintain, customize, and secure your account with us.
• To process your requests, purchases, transactions, and payments and prevent transactional fraud.
• To provide you with support and to respond to your inquiries, including to investigate and address your concerns and monitor and improve our responses.
• To personalize your Website experience and to deliver content and product and service offerings relevant to your interests.
• To help maintain the safety, security, and integrity of our Website, products and services, databases and other technology assets, and business.
• For testing, research, analysis, and product development, including to develop and improve our Website, products, and services.
• To respond to law enforcement requests and as required by applicable law, court order, or governmental regulations.
• As may otherwise be described to you when collecting your personal information or as otherwise set forth in the CCPA.
• To evaluate or conduct a merger, divestiture, restructuring, reorganization, dissolution, or other sale or transfer of some or all of our assets, whether as a going concern or as part of bankruptcy, liquidation, or similar proceeding, in which personal information held by us  about our Website users is among the assets transferred.

We will not collect additional categories of personal information or use the personal information we collected for materially different, unrelated, or incompatible purposes without providing you notice.

Sharing Personal Information:  We may disclose your personal information to a third party for a business purpose. When we disclose personal information for a business purpose, we enter a contract that describes the purpose and requires the recipient to both keep that personal information confidential and not use it for any purpose except performing the contract.

We share your personal information with the following categories of third parties:

• Service providers
• Data aggregators
• Parent or subsidiary organization
• Affiliates
• Internet cookie recipient

Disclosures of Personal Information for a Business Purpose: In the preceding twelve (12) months, Pensionmark has disclosed the following categories of personal information for a business purpose:

Category A:       Identifiers.

Category B:       California Customer Records personal information categories.

Category C:       Protected classification characteristics under California or federal law.

Category D:      Commercial information.

Category F:       Internet or other similar network activity.

Category G:      Geolocation data.

Category I:        Professional or employment-related information

Category K:       Inferences drawn from other personal information.

We disclose your personal information for a business purpose to the following categories of third parties:

• Service providers
• Data aggregators
• Parent or subsidiary organization
• Affiliates
• Internet cookie recipient

Sales of Personal Information:  In the preceding twelve (12) months, Pensionmark has not “sold” personal information in the normal context of a sale; however, we do permit our third-party advertising and analytics providers to collect certain personal information directly from individuals who visit or interact with our website and services. To the extent this practice would be deemed a “sale” by Pensionmark under the CCPA, please review our Privacy Policy for more information about how third parties use cookies and related technologies to collect information automatically on the website, and the choices you have in relation to that collection.

Your Rights and Choices:  The CCPA provides consumers (California residents) with specific rights regarding their personal information. This section describes your CCPA rights and explains how to exercise those rights.

Access to Specific Information and Data Portability Rights:  You have the right to request that we disclose certain information to you about our collection and use of your personal information over the past 12 months. Once we receive and confirm your verifiable consumer request (see Exercising Access, Data Portability, and Deletion Rights), we will disclose to you:

• The categories of personal information we collected about you.
• The categories of sources for the personal information we collected about you.
• Our business or commercial purpose for collecting or selling that personal information.
• The categories of third parties with whom we share that personal information.
• The specific pieces of personal information we collected about you (also called a “data portability request”).
• If we sold or disclosed your personal information for a business purpose, two separate lists disclosing:
• sales, identifying the personal information categories that each category of recipient purchased; and
• disclosures for a business purpose, identifying the personal information categories that each category of recipient obtained.

We do not provide these access and data portability rights for B2B personal information.

Deletion Request Rights:  You have the right to request that we delete any of your personal information that we collected from you and retained, subject to certain exceptions. Once we receive and confirm your verifiable consumer request (see Exercising Access, Data Portability, and Deletion Rights), we will delete (and direct our service providers to delete) your personal information from our records, unless an exception applies.

We may deny your deletion request if retaining the information is necessary for us or our service provider(s) to:

1. Complete the transaction for which we collected the personal information, provide a good or service that you requested, take actions reasonably anticipated within the context of our ongoing business relationship with you, fulfill the terms of a written warranty or product recall conducted in accordance with federal law, or otherwise perform our contract with you.
2. Detect security incidents, protect against malicious, deceptive, fraudulent, or illegal activity, or prosecute those responsible for such activities.
3. Debug products to identify and repair errors that impair existing intended functionality.
4. Exercise free speech, ensure the right of another consumer to exercise their free speech rights, or exercise another right provided for by law.
5. Comply with the California Electronic Communications Privacy Act (Cal. Penal Code § 1546 et. seq.).
6. Engage in public or peer-reviewed scientific, historical, or statistical research in the public interest that adheres to all other applicable ethics and privacy laws, when the information’s deletion may likely render impossible or seriously impair the research’s achievement, if you previously provided informed consent.
7. Enable solely internal uses that are reasonably aligned with consumer expectations based on your relationship with us.
8. Comply with a legal or other regulatory obligation.
9. Make other internal and lawful uses of that information that are compatible with the context in which you provided it.

We do not provide these deletion rights for B2B personal information.

Exercising Access, Data Portability, and Deletion Rights:  To exercise the access, data portability, and deletion rights described above, please submit a verifiable consumer request to us by either:

• Calling us at (888) 201-5488
• Emailing us at compliance@pensionmark.com

Only you, or someone legally authorized to act on your behalf, may make a verifiable consumer request related to your personal information. You may also make a verifiable consumer request on behalf of your minor child.

You may only make a verifiable consumer request for access or data portability twice within a 12-month period.  The verifiable consumer request must:

• Provide sufficient information that allows us to reasonably verify you are the person about whom we collected personal information or an authorized representative.
  For a request to know the categoriesof personal information collected: In order for us to be able to verify the identity of the consumer making this type of request to a reasonable degree of certainty, we must match at least two (2) data points provided by the consumer with data points maintained by the business, which the business has determined to be reliable for the purpose of verifying the consumer.
  For a request to know specific pieces of personal information:  In order for us to verify the identity of consumer making this type of request to a reasonably high degree of certainty, we must match at least three (3) pieces of personal information provided by the consumer with personal information maintained by the us and that we have determined to be reliable for the purpose of verifying the consumer when taken together. This type of request has a “higher bar” for verification and will also require a signed declaration under penalty of perjury that the requestor is the consumer whose personal information is the subject of the request.
• Describe your request with sufficient detail that allows us to properly understand, evaluate, and respond to it.

We cannot respond to your request or provide you with personal information if we cannot verify your identity or authority to make the request and confirm the personal information relates to you.

Making a verifiable consumer request does not require you to create an account with us.

We will only use personal information provided in a verifiable consumer request to verify the requestor’s identity or authority to make the request.

Response, Timing and Format:  We endeavor to respond to a verifiable consumer request within forty-five (45) days of its receipt. If we require more time (up to 45 additional days), we will inform you of the reason and extension period in writing.  We will deliver our written response by mail or electronically, at your option.

Any disclosures we provide will only cover the 12-month period preceding the verifiable consumer request’s receipt. The response we provide will also explain the reasons we cannot comply with a request, if applicable. For data portability requests, we will select a format to provide your personal information that is readily useable and should allow you to transmit the information from one entity to another entity without hindrance, in a secure electronic format.

We do not charge a fee to process or respond to your verifiable consumer request unless it is excessive, repetitive, or manifestly unfounded. If we determine that the request warrants a fee, we will tell you why we made that decision and provide you with a cost estimate before completing your request.

Non-Discrimination:  We will not discriminate against you for exercising any of your CCPA rights. Unless permitted by the CCPA, we will not:

• Deny you goods or services.
• Charge you different prices or rates for goods or services, including through granting discounts or other benefits, or imposing penalties.
• Provide you a different level or quality of goods or services.
• Suggest that you may receive a different price or rate for goods or services or a different level or quality of goods or services.

Changes to Our Privacy Notice:  We reserve the right to amend this Privacy Notice at our discretion and at any time. When we make changes to this privacy notice, we will post the updated notice on the Pensionmark website and update the notice’s effective date. If you are a California client, we will deliver an updated Privacy Notice annually. Your continued use of our website following the posting of changes or continuation as a client after receipt of a copy of the Privacy Notice constitutes your acceptance of such changes.

Contact Information:  If you have any questions or comments about this notice, the ways in which Pensionmark collects and uses your information described in this supplemental notice and in the Privacy Policy, your choices and rights regarding such use, or wish to exercise your rights under California law, please do not hesitate to contact us at:

Phone: (888) 201-5488

Email: compliance@pensionmark.com

Address: Pensionmark Financial Group

Attention: Compliance

24 E. Cota Street, Suite 200

Santa Barbara, CA 93101