"The largest punitive damage award was $1,840,665 in Abel v. Brookville Capital Partners LLC (FINRA ID #13-02540 (NYC, 5/28/15)), followed by $750,000 in Lowery v. John Thomas Financial (FINRA ID #13-02763 (Atlanta, GA)). The median award was $104,000 and the smallest was $15,000. Panels awarded slightly more than $4.6 million altogether ($4,605,586, if you must know), yielding an average* punitive award of $329,000. Interestingly, when arbitrators award punitive damages, they do not necessarily award as much as or a multiple of the compensatory award. Overall, punitives equaled only 28% of the entire damage award and were only 58% the size of the compensatory damage awards."
For the full survey - Mini-Survey: Customer-Member Punitive Damages in 2015:
