WASHINGTON, D.C.— Benjamin Schiffrin, Director of Securities Policy for Better Markets, issued the following statement in response to Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chair Paul Atkins’s announcement of the SEC’s 2026 agenda: 

“The SEC simply does not care about what is good for investors. That is the inescapable conclusion from Chair Atkins’s statement about the agency’s 2026 agenda. That agenda continues to mirror the financial industry’s agenda. Chair Atkins articulated three priorities: legitimizing crypto assets, reducing disclosures about public companies, and exposing retail investors to turbulent and opaque private markets. These agenda items represent the financial industry’s wish list, not the priorities that are in the best interests of the investing public. 

• There is no reason for the SEC to promote crypto. Crypto still has no legitimate use case. The crypto markets have lost trillions in value over the last eight months. Companies that have invested in crypto have suffered $8 billion in losses. And analysts have slashed their forecasts for bitcoin and ether in light of reduced interest. Yet the SEC continues to pretend that crypto is something investors need and want.  

• The SEC should want investors to receive more disclosure, not less. The disclosures that public companies are required to provide investors are what protect investors in the marketplace. Disclosures ensure that investors receive material information about the companies that seek their money so they can make informed investment decisions. Yet the changes to the disclosure regime that the SEC proposes would cut in half the information public companies must provide investors.  

• Now is hardly the time to expose retail investors to the private markets. Investors can’t escape the private markets fast enough. In the second quarter of 2026, investors sought to withdraw $15.6 billion from private credit funds, up from the $13.9 billion they sought to withdraw in the first quarter. This “freak out,” as the industry itself has described investor behavior, suggests the SEC should be trying to protect retail investors from the private markets, not facilitate their entry into them.  

“With respect to all three priorities, Chair Atkins says that the agency will pursue these goals with ‘guardrails’ or ‘protections’ or ‘safeguards’ for investors. But investors should not be fooled by the lip service the agency pays to investor protection. This SEC is intent on demolishing investor protection, and its 2026 agenda is just further proof that the agency is no longer the investor’s advocate but now the advocate for the very industry it regulates.” 

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Better Markets is a non-profit, non-partisan, and independent organization founded in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis to promote the public interest in the financial markets, support the financial reform of Wall Street and make our financial system work for all Americans again. Better Markets works with allies—including many in finance—to promote pro-market, pro-business and pro-growth policies that help build a stronger, safer financial system that protects and promotes Americans’ jobs, savings, retirements and more. To learn more, visit www.bettermarkets.org.