SEC v. Chad Stickforth (2023)
Settled
Checked against the primary document on October 3, 2026. The library's summary, tags and figures for this record were compared with the regulator's own document by an AI model (Claude) following written instructions, with sampled and disputed records read a second time. No lawyer has reviewed them. A checked record can still contain errors, and checked does not mean endorsed. See how we check records or report a correction.
In August 2023 the SEC announced a settlement with Chad Stickforth. The SEC announced a settled complaint alleging that Stickforth raised about $5.4 million from twenty investors for a futures fund, traded little, and misused the rest for personal expenses, a partner and Ponzi-like payments. The proposed judgment, subject to court approval, orders $1,546,197 in disgorgement and interest combined, a $223,229 penalty and an officer-and-director bar.
The record
| Agency | SEC |
|---|---|
| Release number | LR-25806 |
| Date filed | 2023-08-08 |
| Date resolved | 2023-08-08 |
| Court | U.S. District Court, District of Colorado |
| Status | settled |
| Asset class | futures |
| Criminal parallel | No |
| Bars imposed | officer-and-director bar |
| Defendants | Chad Stickforth |
| Cited as charged or alleged | Advisers Act s.206 ; Exchange Act s.10(b) and Rule 10b-5 ; Securities Act s.17(a) |
| Techniques |
What was ordered
- Civil penalty
- $223k
- Disgorgement
- —
- Prejudgment interest
- —
- Total relief
- $223k
- Alleged gain
- —
What is alleged to have happened
The Securities and Exchange Commission announced this matter on August 8, 2023 as release LR-25806. The SEC announced a settled complaint alleging that Stickforth raised about $5.4 million from twenty investors for a futures fund, traded little, and misused the rest for personal expenses, a partner and Ponzi-like payments. The proposed judgment, subject to court approval, orders $1,546,197 in disgorgement and interest combined, a $223,229 penalty and an officer-and-director bar.
This library does not tag the matter as a Ponzi scheme: on a source check, the document mentions Ponzi-like payments only in passing, or as part of another party's scheme, and the charges are about something else. The tagging is ours, not the regulator's: agencies charge statutory provisions, not technique names.
The relief recorded in our data is a civil penalty of $223,229, as the release or order states it. Penalty and disgorgement are distinct: disgorgement returns the gain, while the penalty is punitive. We store them separately so that aggregate figures across the library are not double-counted.
Non-monetary relief recorded: officer-and-director bar.
Timeline
- 2023-08-08 Litigation release published
Primary documents
Everything on this page derives from the documents below. Where our summary and the primary document disagree, the primary document is right.