SEC, CFTC Are "Not Walking Away" From Traditional Enforcement Areas, But Otherwise Will "Wait And See"

This afternoon's Special Conversation with Enforcers & Regulators session at the ABA White Collar Crime Conference featured — rarely, for this conference — government participation in the form of Antonia Apps (Acting Deputy Director of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Enforcement Division) and Brian Young (Director of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) Enforcement Division). The message from both was the same and a bit surprising to hear in the current climate: that both the SEC and CFTC were not going anywhere, but were "getting back to basics" and continuing to prosecute cases "core" to their central purpose.

Both speakers carefully threaded the needle between recent Trump administration announcements and the core message of their continued enforcement priorities. For the SEC, Apps listed areas such as offering-related Ponzi schemes, disclosure cases, accounting fraud, insider trading, deceptive market practices such as price