In the following guest post, Sarah Abrams reviews the SEC’s recent updates to its Enforcement Manual and considers the directors’ and officers’ liability implications. My thanks to Sarah for allowing me to publish her article as a guest post on this site. Here is Sarah’s article. Continue Reading Guest Post: The SEC Updates its Enforcement Manual
There is no doubt that the SEC under current Chair Paul Atkins has taken a different enforcement approach than under the prior administration. The statistics (at least those through the end of the last fiscal year) show a notable decrease in the number of SEC enforcement actions under the Trump administration. As questions arise about the current administration’s enforcement approach, including whether the agency’s approach might embolden would-be wrongdoers, one particular question has been with respect to the Director of the agency’s Enforcement Division. Observers have asked whether the division director, Margaret “Meg” Ryan, who was nominated to her position last August, is deliberately leading the division in a hands-off approach.Continue Reading SEC Enforcement Division Director Assures of Continued Vigilance
In the following guest post, Sarah Abrams, Head of Claims Baleen Specialty, a division of Bowhead Specialty, examines the question whether the SEC should adopt AI-specific disclosure guidelines with reference to two recent enforcement actions involving tech companies allegedly fraudulent claims about their technology. I would like to thank Sarah for allowing me to publish her article on this site. Here is Sarah’s article.Continue Reading Guest Post: Would Specific SEC Disclosure Guidelines Deter AI-Washing?
The U.S. Supreme Court only rarely agrees to take up consideration of cases involving securities law issues, so it was a noteworthy event when the Court agreed late last week to take up a case involving the SEC’s enforcement powers. As discussed below, the case involves questions of what the SEC has to prove in order to secure disgorgement from alleged wrongdoers. The Court’s ruling in the case, which is captioned Sripetch v. SEC, will address a split in the Circuit Courts on the question of whether the SEC must prove that investors were harmed by the wrongdoers’ acts in order to obtain disgorgement.Continue Reading Supreme Court Agrees to Consider SEC’s Disgorgement Remedy Rights
In a recent post, I noted the significant downturn in the amount of SEC enforcement activity during the 2025 fiscal year (ended September 20, 2025). What was true FY 2025 with respect to SEC enforcement activity in general was also true in particular with respect to SEC enforcement activity involving publicly traded companies. According to a new report, SEC enforcement activity against public companies and their subsidiaries also declined significantly during FY 20225. The report, written by Cornerstone Research in conjunction with the Securities Enforcement Empirical Database (SEED) of the NYU Pollack Center for Law & Business, contains a number of interesting observations about the level of enforcement activity in the agency’s final days under outgoing SEC Chair Gary Gensler, compared to the activity levels under the agency’s current Chair, Paul Atkins.Continue Reading Cornerstone Research: SEC Public Company Enforcement Actions Decline
In the 2025 fiscal year (ended September 30, 2025), the SEC’s enforcement activity, as measured by the number of stand-alone enforcement actions, was at its lowest level in ten years. While the decline was reflected across many categories of SEC enforcement, there were certain specific areas – such as cases involving insider trading and market manipulation – where SEC activity actually increased. And notwithstanding the overall decline in SEC enforcement activity, there are signs to suggest that foreign companies listed on U.S. exchanges should be prepared heightened SEC scrutiny and enforcement activity, as discussed below.Continue Reading SEC Enforcement Actions Decline, But Foreign Cos. Should Remain Vigilant
In my recent roundup of the top current stories in the world of D&O, I noted the increasing importance of geopolitical issues as a source of D&O claims risk. Among the factors supporting this trend is the rising relevance of cross-border enforcement initiatives, which in many instances had led to D&O claims. In the latest sign of the importance of cross-border enforcement issues, the SEC has announced the formation of a cross-border task force to “identify and combat cross-border fraud harming U.S. investors.” The SEC’s September 5, 2025, press release about the task force can be found here. A September 10, 2025, post on TheCorporateCounsel.net blog about the new task force’s formation can be found here.Continue Reading SEC Forms Task Force to Combat Cross-Border Fraud
We are now well into the new Trump administration. The President’s nominee to head the SEC, Paul Atkins, has now been sworn in. At the same time, the SEC is also dealing with the fallout from the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last term in the Jarkesy case. In the following guest post, Sarah Abrams takes a look at what all this could mean for the SEC. Sarah is Head of Claims, Baleen Specialty, a division of Bowhead Specialty. I would like to thank Sarah for allowing me to publish her article on my site. I welcome guest post submissions from responsible authors on topics of interest to this site’s readers. Please contact me directly if you would like to submit a guest post. Here is Sarah’s article. Continue Reading The Post-Jarkesy, Atkins SEC
On April 21, 2025, Paul Atkins, President Trump’s nominee, was officially sworn in as the 34th Chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission. Atkins, who previously served as an SEC Commissioner from 2002 to 2008 during the George W. Bush administration, brings extensive prior SEC experience to his new post. In many ways that are already in evidence at the SEC in the early days of the Trump administration, the new leadership is likely to result in many significant changes in direction at the agency.Continue Reading Paul Atkins Chair Sworn In as SEC Chair
In parallel actions last week, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York and the SEC charged a tech exec with securities fraud in connection with fundraising for his company based on misrepresentations about the company’s AI capabilities. The exec, Albert Saniger, allegedly raised over $42 million by misrepresenting to investors that his company’s app used AI technology to complete online shopping purchases, when in fact the purchases were completed manually by contract workers located in the Philippines and elsewhere. As discussed below, there are several interesting features to these AI-related allegations.Continue Reading Tech Exec Charged with AI Washing-Related Securities Fraud