About the Institute
A profession of conduct.
The Institute of Ethical Finance is a professional standards body. It exists to establish, maintain, and advance professional ethical standards for individuals entrusted with financial decision-making, through the conferral and governance of professional designations under a published Code of Ethics.
Mission. To advance ethical conduct, transparency, and professional integrity among individuals responsible for financial decision-making and the stewardship of financial resources.
Vision. To establish a globally recognized ethical standard for professionals who manage, influence, or oversee financial resources, and to make ethical practice in finance both visible and verifiable.
Core Principle. Integritas Supra Lucrum — Integrity Above Profit. The Institute does not reject profit. It rejects profit pursued at the expense of integrity, fairness, transparency, or accountability.
Three layers, by design.
The Institute is organized across three institutional layers. The separation is structural — each layer holds authority the others do not, so that no single function can compromise another.
The Operating Entity.
Institute of Ethical Finance — the Indiana for-profit Public Benefit Corporation that runs the platform, administers the assessment, collects fees, and maintains records. The Operating Entity does not own the meaning of the designations.
The Order.
The Order of Ethical Finance Practitioners — the professional community of designation holders. The Order owns the meaning of EFP, CEFP, and FOEFP. Members of the Order are bound to one another by the Oath and the Code.
The Board of Standards and Ethics.
The independent governance body with authority over standards-setting and enforcement. The Board has structurally enforced independence from the Operating Entity's commercial functions. Disciplinary authority lives here.
A public benefit corporation by design.
The Institute is organized as an Indiana for-profit corporation electing public benefit corporation status under Indiana Code § 23-1.3. The election produces three substantive consequences. First, directors are required to consider the Institute's stated public benefit alongside shareholder interests when making decisions affecting the corporation. Second, the mission is a charter constraint, not a statement of intent. Third, the Institute publishes an annual benefit report — the Annual Report on the State of the Standards — measuring its performance against the stated public benefit.
"To establish, maintain, and advance professional ethical standards for individuals entrusted with financial decision-making, through the conferral and governance of professional designations under the Institute's Code of Ethics."
Leadership
Who runs the Institute.
The Institute is in its first operational year. The roles below describe both the offices that are currently filled and the offices that are being formed. The Institute discloses the offices currently filled, the limits of authority within each office, and the path by which the offices being formed will be seated.
J. A. Mansa
Founder and Executive Chairman
Mansa founded the Institute of Ethical Finance in 2026, drawing on seventeen years of professional experience in finance and accounting and six years of prior service in the United States Army.
He currently serves as Chief Financial and Operating Officer of STEM From Dance, a New York-based national nonprofit organization — a role he holds independently of his work at the Institute. His career spans ten years in private-sector finance, including a tenure at ALG Worldwide Logistics, and seven years of nonprofit executive financial leadership. He has previously held faculty appointments teaching accounting and corporate finance at Ivy Tech Community College in Indianapolis, King Saud University in Riyadh, and the University of Bahrain.
In 2021, he was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to conduct research on ethical financial technology in the Kingdom of Bahrain — work that informed the intellectual foundation of the Institute. His ongoing doctoral research examines the effects of artificial intelligence on ethically compliant investment decisions and outcomes.
He holds a Master of Finance from Colorado State University and a Bachelor of Interdisciplinary Studies from Indiana University.
Why the Institute exists.
Mansa founded the Institute on a single observation: ethics in financial practice is treated as a subset of professional competence, when it should be the foundation of it. The CFA, CPA, CFP, and FRM are credentials of competence by design. None of them is, by design, a credential of conduct. The Institute exists to fill that gap — and to give practitioners across the financial-decision spectrum a structured way to signal, and be held accountable to, their ongoing ethical commitment.
Limits of authority.
Per the Institute's Foundational Charter (Section 9) and Articles of Incorporation, the offices of Founder and Executive Chairman do not carry governance authority over the Institute's standards or enforcement functions:
- The Executive Chairman may sit on the Board of Standards and Ethics only as ex officio non-voting member.
- The Executive Chairman does not have authority to suspend, revoke, or otherwise modify any member's designation. Disciplinary determinations rest with the Board.
- The Executive Chairman does not have authority to amend the Code of Ethics. Amendments are reserved to the Board under procedures set out in the Charter.
- While the Founder appoints the inaugural Board of Standards and Ethics, subsequent Board members are seated by majority vote of the sitting Board. The Founder may nominate but cannot appoint thereafter.
The intent of this structural separation is to ensure that the Institute's commercial operations and its standards-setting authority remain credibly independent of one another, and that no party — including the Founder — can compromise the integrity of one through the other.
Jocelyn Nunes
Registrar of the Order
The Registrar of the Order administers the Integritas Oath, maintains the Practitioner Registry, and serves as the Institute's principal officer in matters of conferral, status verification, and member records. The Registrar is appointed under the Foundational Charter and operates independently of the Institute's commercial functions.
The Registrar's authority extends to the issuance of certificates, the assignment of registry numbers, the recording of conferrals and status changes, and the publication of disciplinary outcomes affecting the active status of designations. The Registrar is the public point of contact for verification inquiries and for matters relating to a designation's standing in the Registry.
The Registrar of the Order may be reached at registrar@ethfin.org.
The Chancellor of the Order
The voice of the practitioner community.
The Chancellor of the Order of Ethical Finance Practitioners presides at Oath Ceremonies and Fellowship inductions, co-signs Fellowship certificates alongside the Registrar, delivers the Order's Annual Charge to the membership, and represents the practitioner community on matters of ceremonial identity. The Chancellor's office is ceremonial and representative — not executive. The Chancellor holds no vote on Board matters, cannot amend the Code, and has no operational authority over the Institute.
Per the Foundational Charter (Section 7.3), the Chancellor serves a fixed three-year term, renewable once for a maximum of six consecutive years. The office is elected by majority vote of the seated Fellows of the Order, from among the seated Fellows. Because the Fellowship is itself being inaugurated, the office is held by the Founder by appointment in the interim — a transitional arrangement provided by the Charter and time-bounded by the seating of the fifth Fellow, at which point election by the seated Fellows commences. The Founder may stand for election alongside other Fellows but holds no preferential standing under the steady-state procedure.
The Board of Standards and Ethics
An independent governance body, being formed.
The Board of Standards and Ethics is the governance body responsible for the Institute's standards-setting and enforcement functions. The credibility of every designation, every disciplinary determination, and every public-facing claim of the Institute rests on the Board's integrity. The Board is being formed; this section describes its structure, authority, and the path by which seats will be filled.
Composition.
The Board consists of seven members, structured to ensure professional breadth and tie-breaking capacity. The Charter specifies a recommended composition by professional background:
- One senior finance executive (former CFO, treasurer, or similar).
- One CFA charterholder or institutional investor with credentialing experience.
- One CPA or audit professional.
- One academic in finance, economics, or business ethics.
- One legal, compliance, or risk management professional with expertise in financial regulation.
- One ethical or philosophical scholar.
- One senior practitioner from an underrepresented sector — public sector finance, nonprofit financial management, or ethical investing.
Authority.
The Board holds, and management cannot override, the following authorities:
- Approval and amendment of the Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct.
- Final determination of disciplinary matters, including suspension and revocation of designations.
- Approval of designation requirements, including examination content frameworks and experience standards.
- Approval of Fellowship standards and Fellowship admissions.
- Issuance of interpretive guidance on ethical questions in financial practice.
- Engagement of independent legal counsel reporting to the Board.
- Annual public report on the state of the Institute's standards and disciplinary activity, which also satisfies the Institute's annual benefit reporting obligation under Indiana Code § 23-1.3.
Terms.
Members serve fixed three-year terms, renewable once. Inaugural terms are staggered — three members at one-year terms, two at two-year terms, two at three-year terms — to establish continuity for subsequent rotation. After the inaugural Board, vacancies are filled by majority vote of the sitting Board. The Founder may nominate but cannot appoint subsequent members.
Independence.
Members may not be employees, contractors, or owners of the Institute, the Order, or any affiliated entity, and may not derive any compensation from the Institute other than Board stipends. The Board retains its own outside legal counsel reporting to the Board. Resignations are public; resignations citing governance concerns must be acknowledged in writing by the Institute. The Board may, by two-thirds vote, publish a public statement on any matter affecting the Institute's standards integrity, with or without management consent.
Express interest.
The inaugural Board is being seated through invitation and direct outreach by the Founder. Practitioners interested in being considered for Board service — for the inaugural Board or for subsequent rotation — may express interest through the form below. The interest form is reviewed by the Founder and, once seated, by the Board's nominating procedures.
Integritas Supra Lucrum.