Jay Clayton was nominated to chair the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on January 20, 2017 by President Donald Trump and sworn in on May 4, 2017.
Since joining the Commission, Chairman Clayton has focused on the long-term interests of America’s retail investors, a perspective he shares with the SEC staff. Chairman Clayton has made it a priority to increase the access of retail investors to a diverse range of investment opportunities and see that they continue to benefit from the protections of our securities laws.
Key areas of focus for Chairman Clayton include:
making our capital markets more accessible to businesses and investors alike, while ensuring the United States continues to be the world’s leader in terms of effective disclosure and other investor protections; and
examining and addressing equity and fixed income market structure issues with an emphasis on fairness, efficiency and resiliency, recognizing that our markets are ever-changing.
Chairman Clayton also has been outspoken on securities law issues related to distributed ledger technology, cryptocurrencies and initial coin offerings.
Prior to joining the Commission, Chairman Clayton was a partner at Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, where he was a member of the firm’s Management Committee and co-head of the firm’s corporate practice.
Chairman Clayton has authored publications on securities law, cybersecurity, and other regulatory issues, and from 2009 to 2017 he was a Lecturer in Law and Adjunct Professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. Prior to joining Sullivan & Cromwell, Chairman Clayton served as a law clerk for the Honorable Marvin Katz of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. A member of the New York and Washington, D.C. bars, Chairman Clayton earned a B.S. in Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania (summa cum laude), a B.A. and M.A. in Economics from the University of Cambridge (Thouron Scholar), and a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School (cum laude, Order of the Coif).
Chairman Clayton was born at Fort Eustis in Newport News, Virginia and was raised primarily in central and southeastern Pennsylvania. In his professional career, he has lived in Philadelphia, New York, London, and Washington, D.C.
