Some previous enforcement actions in opposition to cryptocurrency firms lacked clear investor profit and misinterpreted federal securities legal guidelines, the US Securities and Alternate Fee (SEC) mentioned on Tuesday.
Because the 2022 fiscal yr, the SEC introduced 95 actions and $2.3 billion in penalties for “book-and-record violations,” it mentioned in a press release about its enforcement outcomes for 2025.
“Along with seven crypto agency registration-related and 6 ‘definition of a vendor’ instances, these instances recognized no direct investor hurt from these violations, produced no investor profit or safety.”
It additionally mirrored a “bias for quantity of instances introduced versus issues of investor safety,” a misallocation of assets and a misinterpretation of federal securities legal guidelines, the SEC mentioned.
It’s the newest instance of the regulator’s shift in method in direction of enforcement because it got here beneath new management beneath SEC Chair Paul Atkins in April 2025.
His predecessor, former SEC Chair Gary Gensler, has been accused of pursuing a regulation-by-enforcement method towards crypto. Since his departure, the SEC has adopted a friendlier stance towards digital belongings.
SEC mentioned it’s shifting its focus to high quality over amount
Within the lead-up to Donald Trump’s 2025 inauguration, the SEC enforcement division engaged in an “unprecedented rush” to deliver instances and moved forward with an “aggressive pursuit of novel authorized theories,” the company mentioned.
Atkins mentioned the company has since shifted away from this method, ending regulation by enforcement and refocusing on the fee’s core mission by prioritizing instances that present significant investor safety and strengthen market integrity.
“Now we have redirected assets towards the forms of misconduct that inflict the best hurt—notably fraud, market manipulation, and abuses of belief—and away from approaches that prioritized quantity and record-setting penalties over true investor safety,” he added.
Consulting agency Cornerstone Analysis reported in November that beneath Atkins, the variety of enforcement actions in opposition to public firms, together with these involving crypto, decreased by about 30% in fiscal 2025 in contrast with fiscal 2024.
In reference to 2025 enforcement actions, the SEC mentioned it obtained orders for financial aid totaling $17.9 billion, comprising $7.2 billion in civil penalties and the rest in disgorgement and prejudgment curiosity.
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“This yr’s enforcement outcomes make clear the failings of those actions and their respective penalties and re-establish the definition and measure of enforcement effectiveness, grounded in Congress’ authentic intent and targeted on bringing actions that really forestall investor hurt as an alternative of headlines and inflated numbers,” the SEC mentioned.
Some crypto firms are nonetheless within the firing line
Regardless of the SEC’s enforcement shift, a number of crypto firms have been nonetheless hit with enforcement actions in 2025.
In Might 2025, Unicoin and 4 of its present and former executives have been sued by the SEC for allegedly elevating $100 million by deceptive traders about certificates that presupposed to convey rights to obtain Unicoin tokens and inventory. Nevertheless, the platform has accused the company of distorting its regulatory statements to construct a case.
The SEC additionally filed a civil grievance in opposition to Ramil Ventura Palafox in April 2025, CEO of Praetorian Group Worldwide, for allegedly orchestrating a $200 million Ponzi scheme. A parallel legal case introduced by the US Division of Justice resulted in Palafox’s February sentence of 20 years in jail.
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