(Article from Registered Funds Regulatory Update, July 2026)
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On April 7, 2026, the SEC announced its enforcement results for fiscal year 2025, which ended on September 30, 2025. During fiscal year 2025, the SEC filed 456 total enforcement actions, down from the 583 actions filed in the 2024 fiscal year, and obtained orders for $17.9 billion in financial remedies, up from $8.2 billion obtained in the 2024 fiscal year. The $17.9 billion in aggregate financial remedies consisted of $10.8 billion in disgorgement and prejudgment interest, and $7.2 billion in civil penalties. The SEC also obtained orders barring 119 individuals from serving as officers and directors of public companies.
The SEC distributed approximately $262 million to harmed investors and issued whistleblower awards totaling approximately $60 million, down from nearly $255 million in the previous year. The SEC reported that it received a record 53,753 tips, complaints, and referrals in total in fiscal year 2025, nearly 19% more than in the prior fiscal year.
The SEC described fiscal year 2025 as a unique period of transition and stated that the current Commission has recentered the enforcement program on investor protection and market integrity. The SEC highlighted actions involving offering frauds, market manipulation, insider trading, issuer disclosure violations, and breaches of fiduciary duty by investment advisers. Notably, the SEC focused on protecting the interests of retail investors, who may be particularly vulnerable to securities fraud, while prioritizing identifying and remedying fraudulent conduct. The enforcement actions brought or settled by the SEC in fiscal year 2025 included, for example:
- Individual accountability. Approximately two-thirds of standalone actions filed in fiscal year 2025 involved charges against one or more individual bad actors, a 27% year-over-year increase, and nearly nine out of every 10 standalone actions filed under SEC Acting Chair Mark Uyeda and SEC Chair Paul Atkins involved individual charges.
- Retail investor fraud and investor harm. The SEC noted actions addressing conduct involving fraudsters who targeted veterans, seniors, and members of religious communities, including actions involving alleged losses of approximately $400 million from approximately 2,700 investors and more than $140 million from approximately 300 investors.
- Market integrity and disclosure cases. The SEC highlighted actions involving market manipulation, insider trading, issuer disclosure violations, and breaches of fiduciary duty by investment advisers, including actions against Allarity Therapeutics, Inc. for alleged disclosure failures and Vanguard Advisers, Inc. for allegedly failing to adequately disclose conflicts of interest.
- Emerging technologies and cross-border misconduct. In February 2025, the SEC announced the Cyber and Emerging Technologies Unit to combat misconduct involving blockchain technology, AI, account takeovers, cybersecurity, and other areas, and in September 2025, the SEC formed the Cross-Border Task Force to address threats posed by fraudsters located abroad.
- Cooperation, remediation, and case selection. The SEC stated that, as a result of self-policing, self-reporting, remediation, and cooperation, the Division recommended reduced civil penalties or declined to recommend enforcement actions in certain matters; the release also noted the current Commission’s resolution of prior cases that it viewed as not sufficiently grounded in the federal securities laws.
The monetary relief reported for the fiscal year 2025 was attributable in significant part to judgments entered against Robert Allen Stanford and other defendants in the SEC’s long-running litigation arising out of an $8 billion Ponzi scheme, in which the monetary relief obtained totaled $1.4 billion in disgorgement and prejudgment interest, as well as $1.3 billion in civil penalties. The SEC also highlighted trial victories, including a jury verdict against Massachusetts-based investment adviser Jeffrey Cutter and Cutter Financial Group, LLC for violations of Section 206(2) of the Advisers Act and a jury verdict against Steven M. Gallagher for securities fraud and manipulative trading in connection with an alleged scheme to manipulate stocks using Twitter.
The SEC framed fiscal year 2025 as a reset away from volume-driven enforcement statistics and toward cases that provide meaningful investor protection and strengthen market integrity. The release emphasized that future enforcement priorities and results will be linked to the Commission’s and the Division’s core mandate, including standing up to fraud in its many forms, addressing fraudulent and manipulative conduct through appropriate remediation, and repaying investor losses when harmed.
SEC Press Release, SEC Announces Enforcement Results for Fiscal Year 2025 (Apr. 7, 2026), available at: https://www.sec.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2026-34.