Merge the SEC and CFTC into a New "Financial Markets Agency?"

SEC Enforcement, Penalties Fall After Leadership Change, Report Finds

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission under the Trump administration brought just four enforcement actions in fiscal year 2025, the lowest amount initiated for a new SEC administration since at least 2013, a new study found.

That figure amounted to 7% of all enforcement actions taken in the 2025 fiscal year, which began Oct. 1, 2024—almost three months before President Donald Trump took office on Jan. 20, according to the study released Tuesday by Cornerstone Research and the New York University Pollack Center for Law & Business.

The SEC under former Chair Gary Gensler took 52 enforcement actions between Oct. 1, 2024, and Trump’s inauguration, the highest amount for an outgoing chair since 2013. The commission took 23 enforcement actions in the January of Gensler’s departure, the most of any January on record, the report found.

The best way to regulate digital assets: Merge the SEC and CFTC

Merging the SEC and CFTC has been suggested many times before, but the politics have always been challenging. The House Financial Services Committee and the Senate Banking Committee oversee the SEC, while the respective agriculture committees oversee the CFTC. That reflects the CFTC’s origins, having begun as an office within the Agriculture Department because of the importance of agricultural futures to farmers.

Having had the honor of chairing the CFTC, I apologize to my former colleagues if they feel I’ve thrown them under the bus. But a merger could be a boon for the CFTC’s historic mission of regulating the markets for derivatives on physical commodities like agricultural products, metals, and energy. Those markets are critical to the global economy and to the livelihood of farmers and many other firms up and down supply chains and may not be getting sufficient attention given the recent expansion of the CFTC’s mission into crypto and prediction markets.

A merger could reinforce the importance of those markets. We could create a vice chairman to oversee regulatory responsibilities for historic commodities just as we created a vice chairman for supervision at the Federal Reserve Board. That position could be subject to confirmation and oversight by the Congressional agricultural committees, maintaining their oversight roles and easing legislative enactment of merger. The new agency should be given a new name, like the Financial Markets Agency. This is not an acquisition, and we should instill a new, joint culture.

US charges ex-investment banker, 7 others in global insider-trading scheme

U.S. prosecutors on Tuesday unveiled charges against eight men accused of belonging to a global network that made tens of millions of dollars trading on inside information about the finances and merger plans of numerous companies for years.

Federal prosecutors in Boston said the insider trading scheme ran from 2016 to 2024 and was led by Samy Khouadja, a former Merrill Lynch banker in France; Eamma Safi, who co-owned a French restaurant with Khouadja; and Singapore citizen Zhi Ge.

Safi is in U.S. custody and pleaded not guilty earlier this year. Ge was provisionally arrested in 2024 in Singapore and is subject to extradition proceedings.

The other six defendants are considered fugitives, the U.S. Justice Department said. Those include Khouadja, who worked at Bank of America’s Merrill Lynch until 2014 and is facing securities fraud and money laundering conspiracy charges.

“Why this merits less than a permanent bar is a head-scratcher”

Not quite sure what to make of this. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission just published a new administrative follow-on order barring Anthony Viggiano, a former Goldman Sachs analyst who tipped two friends with inside information, from acting as a broker, dealer, investment adviser, etc. with a right to reapply in 10 years. I didn’t remember any similar bars (that is, with the 10-year right to reapply) but it turns out there have been at least two others – one in 2024 and one earlier this year. That said, Viggiano already pleaded guilty in a parallel criminal case, in addition to settling with the SEC. Why this merits less than a permanent bar is a head-scratcher, though Viggiano’s youth (he’s just 28) probably has something to do with it. I didn’t see anything suggesting Viggiano cooperated in the case. I’ll be interested to see if the use of these types of long, but not permanent, bars becomes more common.

U.S. Fraud Case Against Indian Tycoon Adani at a Standstill

A year ago, the Department of Justice under former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. surprised India by indicting Gautam Adani, the country’s most prominent businessman with personal ties to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, on charges of wire and securities fraud.

Since then, there has been nearly nothing to show. The case against Mr. Adani, whose indictment was announced on Nov. 20 last year, two weeks after President Trump won re-election, has remained dormant on the federal docket.