Report: 700+ SEC Staff Have Resigned, Including More Than 150 in Enforcement

US SEC to see exodus as hundreds take Trump’s buyout offers, sources say

Wall Street’s top regulator is facing a staff exodus across key departments as hundreds have agreed to take resignation offers amid President Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s efforts to remake the U.S. government, five people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

Departures from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, including by senior staff and enforcement lawyers, could significantly hamper the watchdog’s efforts to police markets and protect investors, the sources said. The exits, first reported by Reuters, stem from Trump and Musk’s efforts to slash the federal workforce. […]

According to one of the sources, since late January, when the Trump administration’s first offers to compensate departing workers began, more than 700 SEC staff members have handed in resignation notices, including more than 150 in enforcement.

A second person briefed on the matter said that over a dozen senior staff have taken one of the offers.

Trump’s SEC chairman pick Paul Atkins faces noisy confirmation hearing over crypto

There will soon be a new Wall Street sheriff in Washington – after all the gunsmoke clears out on Capitol Hill, that is.

Paul Atkins, a long-time securities lawyer, is expected to pass his confirmation hearing next week as Donald Trump’s chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Nevertheless, my sources with ties to both parties say he faces a potentially noisy proceeding over his pro-crypto stance, and how he will carry out Trump’s plans to deregulate a sector that took intense heat during the Biden years.

Paul Weiss’ Deal With Trump Raises Fears, but Some Praise ‘Practical Solution’

A day after President Donald Trump announced that Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison chair Brad Karp had agreed to a deal to rescind an executive order, the law firm was getting pummeled with criticism for capitulating to the president. Some lawyers and others in the legal profession grew concerned that it could start a trend of lawyers “caving” to Trump’s demands and may fuel difficulties for firms in challenging the administration.

However, other observers saw Karp as being pragmatic about a challenging situation and acting in the best interests of his firm, including its clients and thousands of lawyers and staff.

Paul Weiss “had no obligation to fight Trump in court,” said New York University law professor Stephen Gillers. “It has obligations to its clients, who must deal with the federal government regularly as an adversary or a regulator, and to its thousands of employees, including lawyers.”

SEC Obtains Final Judgment Against Investment Adviser Arising from Undisclosed Conflicts in Mutual Fund and Account Recommendations

On March 19, 2025, the Securities and Exchange Commission obtained a final judgment by consent against Cambridge Investment Research Advisors, Inc. (CIRA), a registered investment adviser based in Fairfield, Iowa. The Commission had charged CIRA with failing to disclose material conflicts of interest and breaching its duty of care related to its recommendation to place clients in wrap accounts and its selection of mutual funds and money market sweep funds for clients.

The SEC’s complaint filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Iowa on March 1, 2022, alleged that since at least 2014, CIRA repeatedly breached its fiduciary duty to advisory clients by investing client assets in certain mutual funds and money market sweep funds that generated millions of dollars in revenue sharing payments to an affiliated broker-dealer, Cambridge Investment Research, Inc. (CIRI), instead of lower-cost share classes and investment options that would have yielded less or no revenue sharing. The complaint further alleged that CIRA converted hundreds of accounts to its more expensive wrap account program without adequate disclosure and without analyzing whether doing so was in its clients’ best interests. CIRA also avoided paying millions of dollars of transaction fees as a result of its mutual fund recommendations and failed to disclose conflicts resulting from its investment adviser representatives’ receipt of forgivable loans in exchange for maintaining certain asset levels and tenure with CIRI, according to the complaint.

Tornado Cash Delisting

Based on the Administration’s review of the novel legal and policy issues raised by use of financial sanctions against financial and commercial activity occurring within evolving technology and legal environments, we have exercised our discretion to remove the economic sanctions against Tornado Cash as reflected in Treasury’s Monday filing in Van Loon v. Department of the Treasury.

Trump Memecoin News: TRUMP Token Pops 12% as the President Calls It ‘The Greatest of Them All’

Donald Trump’s official memecoin was the best performing digital asset on Monday during asian hours, according to CoinGecko data, after the U.S. President posted on Truth Social calling TRUMP “the greatest of them all” and “cool.”