In Brief:
- The U.S SEC named Dan Berkovitz for General Counsel.
- Dan will join the SEC starting from November 1.
- Previously Berkovitz served as CFTC’s general counsel from 2009 to 2013.
The US SEC named Dan Berkovitz, a commissioner at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), to start a new role of general counsel from November 1.
According to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announcement, SEC’s current Solicitor, Michael Conley, will serve as Acting General Counsel upon Coates’s departure until Berkovitz joins the agency. John Coates will leave a current post in October and will return to academia.
Since Sept 2018, Berkovitz has been serving as Democratic CFTC commissioner. He previously served as the CFTC’s general counsel from 2009 to 2013. Berkovitz was a partner and co-chair of the futures and derivatives practice at the law firm of Wilmer Hale.
As a CFTC commissioner, Berkovitz recently has raised concerns over a fast-growing corner of crypto known as DeFi, or decentralized finance.
“I had the opportunity to work with Dan at the CFTC and I’m thrilled to once again work with him on matters essential to our financial markets,” said SEC Chair Gary Gensler.
Gensler continues, “As general Counsel he navigated the CFTC through dozens of rule makings to enhance regulatory oversight of the swaps markets and he has remained a steadfast public servant as a Commissioner.”
Berkovitz said he is excited with Chair Gensler on a regulatory plan that will enhance “investor protection, strengthen our capital market, and facilitate capital formation.”
The move follows Gensler’s public statement on his desire to tighten the regulations over the crypto space. Last week, Gensler said in an interview with the Washington Post that cryptocurrencies are “highly speculative”.
