The bulk of the payment of the penalty amount is described as "disgorgement," although the money is being paid to the government, not to the firm's customers, and it is not obvious from the facts of the case that the borrowers were victims, beyond the fact of having to repay the loans through payroll deduction.

This is one of those enforcement actions that is somewhat disappointing in what the reader is not told. The first mystery is largely a point of curiosity: if the misconduct stopped in 2010 and the relevant employees were both gone from NYMEX by 2010, why did it take ten years to bring an enforcement action?

More significantly, there is no description of the actual events that might provide guidance as to what NYMEX might have done to prevent the misconduct. That said, this case puts…

Commissioner Peirce provided specific examples of ways in which the SEC could afford small businesses a greater opportunity to raise money. The policy tension is that making it easier for issuers to raise money by lowering the costs of conducting a securities offering necessarily means reducing the degree of regulation over those offerings (such regulation may be protective, but it raises expenses). Commissioner Peirce is willing to make that trade-off to improve the regulatory framework and…

This is the second recent enforcement action the SEC has brought in connection with contingent offers; see the .