A veteran of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Daniel M. Hawke, will step down in August from his position as Chief of the Division of Enforcement’s Market Abuse Unit after sixteen years at the watchdog.
Mr. Hawke rose up the ranks after joining the SEC in 1999, having progressed through the posts of Washington D.C.’s branch chief, Associate Director for Enforcement and subsequently Regional Director in the Philadelphia office, and finally heading the Market Abuse Unit since its inception in January 2010
Since 2010, he has lead a 60-strong team which has launched a number of high-profile enforcement cases against stock exchanges and brokerages, cracking down on hard-to-detect insider trading activity, market structure violations, market manipulation, and other trading abuses, as well as pioneering “ground-breaking” insider-trading technology.
Mr. Hawke plans to return to the private sector, where he spent ten years in Washington D.C. before joining the SEC.
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.
Commenting on the announcement, Andrew Ceresney, Director of the SEC’s Enforcement Division, said, “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. 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 said, “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.”
Deputy Unit Chiefs Robert Cohen and Joseph Sansone will serve as co-acting Unit Chiefs following Mr. Hawke’s departure.
