Financial institutions saw little relief in 2023 from regulatory penalties, as the number of enforcement actions against them reached levels rarely seen in the U.S., according to SteelEye’s annual fine tracker report.
Activities like insider trading, market manipulation, AML breaches and record-keeping failures are drawing additional attention and monetary penalties, according to research by the financial services compliance provider, led by the U.S. SEC and CFTC, which combined for more than $9 billion in penalties in 2023.
The analysis looked at financial penalties issued by the SEC, Commodity Futures Trading Commission in the U.S., the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), France’s Autorite des Marches Financiers (AMF), the Netherlands’ Authority for the Financial Markets (AFM), Germany’s BaFin and Federal Office of Justice and Singapore’s Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS).
Here are a few key findings:
- The SEC and CFTC issued a combined $9.2 billion in penalties, including 32 fines for insider trading alone. The $4.3 billion in penalties handed out by the CFTC was an all-time high for that agency.
- FCA fines fell for the first time in seven years to eight fines, compared to 26 in 2022 and 10 in 2021, alongside…
