SEC Hiring Freeze Hits Enforcement Staff Hard

• SEC Enforcement Division has lost more employees than any other agency group since January 2017, Bloomberg Law review shows

• Annual tally of enforcement actions commission compiles each fall was down 13 percent in 2017

The main SEC group responsible for policing Wall Street has hired only five new staffers despite losing more than three dozen since the waning days of the Obama administration, according to a Bloomberg Law review of agency records.

The Enforcement Division departures — the most in any Securities and Exchange Commission group — come amid a hiring freeze and a drop in enforcement actions. The annual ...