SEC v. Wedbush Securities Inc. (unregistered distributions, 2021)

Settled

✓ Checked against the primary document on October 2, 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.

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In 2021 the SEC settled an administrative order against Wedbush Securities Inc. for facilitating unregistered sales of low-priced securities for an offshore customer and failing to report suspicious activity, with a $1,000,000 penalty.

The record

What was ordered

Civil penalty

$1m

Disgorgement

—

Prejudgment interest

—

Total relief

$1m

Alleged gain

—

A dash means the release did not state a figure we could extract, not that the figure is zero. Penalty and disgorgement are stored separately so aggregates across the library do not double-count the same dollars.

What is alleged to have happened

On December 15, 2021 the SEC accepted a settlement with Wedbush Securities Inc. The order finds that from January 2017 to September 2018 Wedbush effected unregistered offers and sales of large blocks of low-priced securities for an offshore customer, willfully violating Securities Act Sections 5(a) and 5(c), and failed to file suspicious activity reports, violating Exchange Act Section 17(a) and Rule 17a-8. It orders a $1,000,000 penalty. The $165 million previously recorded as alleged gain was the customer's group's trading proceeds, not Wedbush's, and the criminal flag referred to charges against a customer's principal in another matter.

This library tags the matter as unregistered distributions, based on the conduct the document describes. The tagging is ours, not the regulator's: agencies charge statutory provisions, not technique names.

For the regulator's own account of the facts, read the primary document linked above. This page deliberately summarises the structured record rather than reproducing the release.

What technique is this, and how does it work?

This action is tagged with one technique in our taxonomy. The tagging is ours: regulators charge statutory provisions, not technique names, so the mapping is an editorial judgement described in our editorial policy.

• Unregistered distributions — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2021-12-15 Administrative proceeding instituted (cease-and-desist)

Primary documents

Everything on this page derives from the documents below. Where our summary and the primary document disagree, the primary document is right.

• SEC order

The linked release is a work of the United States government and is not subject to copyright. Our summary and narrative above are our own writing.

Related actions

Other actions in the library sharing at least one technique tag with this one.

Record added September 10, 2026. submit a correction.