The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has announced that Daniel M. Hawke, chief of the Division of Enforcement’s Market Abuse Unit and ex-Director of the Philadelphia Regional Office, will leave the agency after 16 years of service. He will step down in August this year to return to the private sector.
Mr. Hawke has been at the helm of the Market Abuse Unit since its launch in January 2010. The unit, comprised of more than 60 attorneys and industry specialists in eight SEC offices, focuses on hard-to-detect insider trading activity, market structure violations, market manipulation, and other trading abuses.
After Mr. Hawke’s departure, Deputy Unit Chiefs Robert Cohen and Joseph Sansone will serve as co-acting Unit Chiefs.
“For the past 16 years, Dan has tirelessly served the Commission’s Enforcement Division and demonstrated the highest dedication to our mission,” said SEC Chair Mary Jo White. “His exemplary leadership in multiple senior roles has served the agency well and the investing public is safer for his service.”
“Dan is known for his strategic vision and built the Market Abuse Unit into a trailblazer in the investigation of market structure violations and complex insider trading schemes,” said Andrew Ceresney, Director of the SEC’s Enforcement Division. “As an important member of our leadership team, he brought significant and innovative actions based on misconduct in the deepest and darkest corners of the market.”
Mr. Hawke commented:
“It has been a great privilege to serve the public as a member of the Division of Enforcement and to have helped create and then lead the Market Abuse Unit. I am proud to have worked alongside an extraordinary group of professionals, past and present, whose quest for excellence, relentless investigative efforts and exemplary integrity built the unit into what it is today.”
SEC enforcement actions brought during Mr. Hawke’s tenure include major cases like charging UBS Securities LLC in January this year with disclosure and sub-penny violations and imposing the largest civil penalty to date against an alternative trading system – more than $14.4 million.
To view the official announcement by SEC, click here.