First Marblehead chief abruptly quits

The chief executive of First Marblehead Corp., a Boston firm specializing in student loan services, abruptly quit yesterday after the firm discovered that he had exchanged gifts worth $32,000 with one of the firm's key clients.

In a statement, First Marblehead's board of directors said it accepted the resignation of Daniel M. Meyers as the company's chairman and chief executive.

Meyers told the board that he purchased the gifts with his own money, but it concluded such exchanges with a client violated the firm's ethics policy, a company spokesman said.

The spokesman, Andrew Komendantov, declined to identify the client or provide further details about the gifts, but said the board only learned about them a few days ago. The board said in its statement that it does not believe Meyers used company funds.

''When the board looked at the size of the gifts, it decided this was a serious matter," Komendantov said. Meyers could not be reached to comment.

First Marblehead picked Jack L. Kopnisky, the firm's president and chief operating officer, to replace Meyers as chief executive and named director William R. Berkley to be interim chairman of the board. In its statement, First Marblehead said Meyers told the board he did not purchase gifts for any other company clients.

The firm's website says, ''Employees and officers must not accept, or permit any member of his or her immediate family to accept any gifts, gratuities, or other favors from any client, vendor, supplier, or any other person doing or seeking to do business with the company, other than items of insignificant value."

That Meyers likely used his own money is largely irrelevant, said W. Michael Hoffman, the executive director of the Center for Business Ethics at Bentley College in Waltham.

''You don't want to give the perception to the public that favors are being exchanged in a way that influences business decisions," Hoffman said. ''The whole purpose of an ethics policy on gifts is to prevent conflicts of interest and the appearance of conflicts of interest."

The departure of Meyers, a company cofounder, raised questions on Wall Street. The move was made after the close of the markets. In regular trading, shares rose 17 cents to $26.80 but fell up to 11 percent in after-hours trading.

''If he's departing suddenly with no heads-up, that's not good," said Ivan Feinseth, a director of research at Matrix USA, a institutional research and brokerage firm in New York.

First Marblehead receives fees for initiating and processing student loans for banks and other lenders. It also packages such loans and sells them as securities.

Chris Reidy can be reached at reidy@globe.com.