According to Cointelegraph, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) set a new record for fines in fiscal year 2024, mainly due to a settlement with encryption company Terraform Labs.
As of September 30, the SEC collected $8.2 billion in fines, the highest in history. Although the number of cases decreased by 26% to 583, the $4.47 billion paid by Terraform and its former CEO Do Kwon accounted for more than half of the total.
Without the Terraform fine, the SEC would have collected only $3.72 billion, the lowest since 2013. The 2024 fine is a 65.5% increase from 2023.
The SEC collected $2.1 billion in fines and $6.1 billion in disgorgement of ill-gotten gains. SEC Chairman Gary Gensler will step down on January 20, 2025.
During Gensler's tenure, the SEC took a tough stance on crypto companies, with crypto cases falling to 11 in 2024, but related fines surged 3,000% due to the Terraform settlement.
The U.S. crypto industry hopes that the SEC's crackdown will end after Trump takes office.