SEC posts FY2026 enforcement results: 348 actions, $1.095B total

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission released its fiscal year 2026 enforcement results on November 10, 2026 — press release 2026-113. The agency filed 348 enforcement actions for the fiscal year ended September 30, 2026, and obtained $1.095 billion in monetary orders.

The headline numbers

Total actions:            348
  Standalone:              235
  Follow-on administrative: 113
Trading suspensions:        13 (Asia-based issuer manipulation)

Total monetary orders:    $1.095 billion
  Disgorgement + PJI:     $752 million (of which $235M satisfied
                                        by a separate non-SEC court order)
  Civil penalties:        $343 million

Returned to harmed investors: ~$731 million to 250,000+ investors

Context: the SEC's FY2025 report, published April 7, 2026, counted 456 actions and $17.9 billion in total monetary relief, though roughly $14.9 billion of that came from a single legacy matter (SEC v. Stanford International Bank), per Sidley's analysis. Davis Polk called FY25 the lowest enforcement count since 2013; FY26's 348 actions is lower still. Independent counts from Brattle Group tracked activity 57% below the eight-year average through Q3.

Crypto breakdown

The SEC's own release highlights the following digital-asset matters, verbatim:

• Three purported crypto asset trading platforms and four investment clubs are alleged to have defrauded retail investors of at least $14 million.
• A bitcoin mining founder allegedly raised over $95.6 million from about 6,400 investors and misappropriated $48.5 million of it.
• In the long-running BitConnect lending-program matter (SEC v. Trevon Brown, et al.), the court ordered $731,281 in disgorgement, $293,703.36 in prejudgment interest, and a $50,000 civil penalty against defendant Michael Noble in July 2026.

Other dates the release flags with crypto-adjacent relevance: the January 2026 Watson/Northstar jury verdict, the February 2026 CryptoFX (Sanchez) verdict, and the May 2026 Newell remedies judgment.

Who spoke

Chair Paul S. Atkins framed the results around mission measurement: "The success of the SEC's enforcement program is ultimately measured by how effectively it advances the SEC's mission." Enforcement Director David Woodcock, who took the role May 4, 2026 after Margaret Ryan's March departure, said the agency's focus is "conducting rigorous investigations, pursuing consequential misconduct."

The release names no new crypto-specific policy. The agency's broader digital-asset posture sits under the June 2 Draft Strategic Plan FY26-FY30 and the Project Crypto workstream.

Pattern

The FY26 results confirm what the mid-year reports had signaled. Monetary totals are down roughly an order of magnitude from the Stanford-inflated FY25, but also well below the trailing average once Stanford is excluded — about $3 billion in both FY23 and FY24. Action counts continued to decline from 583 (FY24) → 456 (FY25) → 348 (FY26). The crypto docket shifts toward fraud cases against retail-facing operators and away from the registration and unregistered-securities theories that dominated the 2022-2024 Gensler-era caseload, which the current Commission has been dismissing since February 2025.

What to watch

1. Full enforcement report: the SEC typically follows the press release with a detailed PDF breaking out case categories. Last year's came the same week; this year's will show the crypto subtotal's share of the $1.095B.
2. Noble appeal: BitConnect defendant Michael Noble's post-judgment posture.
3. Pending crypto matters: the three unnamed "crypto asset trading platforms" from the release.
4. FY2027 priorities: the SEC's FY2027 Examination Priorities already listed tokenization and super-intelligence oversight as focus areas.