The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced that Daniel R. Gregus, Director of the Chicago Regional Office, will leave the agency at the end of December after more than 30 years of service. Vanessa Horton and Kathryn Pyszka will become Acting Co-Directors upon Mr. Gregus’s departure.

Mr. Gregus has led the Chicago office since November 2021. Under his leadership, the Chicago office has developed expertise in broker-dealer sales practices, market structure issues and municipal securities, brought significant and impactful enforcement actions, and conducted hundreds of examinations of SEC-registered broker-dealers, advisers, swap dealers, and transfer agents.

“I thank Dan for his long dedication to public service here at the SEC, most recently by leading the Chicago Regional Office,” said SEC Chair Gary Gensler. “For three decades, Dan performed important work protecting investors and promoting confidence in our markets. I also would like to thank Vanessa Horton and Kathryn Pyszka for taking on the roles of Acting Co-Directors.”

“From leading investigations to leading various programs and initiatives, culminating with his role as Director of the Chicago office, the investing public has benefited immeasurably from Dan’s more than 30-year career at the SEC,” said Gurbir S. Grewal, Director of the SEC’s Enforcement Division. “It is hard to imagine the Chicago Regional Office, not to mention the agency at large, without his leadership and counsel.”

“Dan has made a lasting impact at the Commission. He started his career as an enforcement staff attorney and later moved to the Division of Examinations where he held senior positions in the division, including leading the Chicago Regional Office’s Broker-Dealer Program and the division’s National Clearance and Settlement Program,” said Richard R. Best, Director of the SEC’s Division of Examinations. “Throughout this time, Dan remained committed to protecting investors and has been an outstanding leader, especially during a period of marked growth across the division. We have all benefited from Dan’s wisdom, dedication, and passion.”

Mr. Gregus said, “It has been a privilege to have worked at the SEC for three decades, all in the Chicago office, and, for the last two years, an honor to lead such a talented and dedicated group of public servants committed to the Commission’s mission and the Chicago office’s efforts to protect retail investors, which has been at the core of our work in the region.”

Mr. Gregus has led the SEC’s second-largest regional office, with approximately 300 enforcement attorneys, accountants, analysts, economists, and compliance examiners conducting investigations, litigating enforcement actions and performing compliance examinations in the nine-state Chicago region. Prior to becoming Regional Director, Mr. Gregus led the Examinations Division’s Office of Clearance and Settlement Examinations and earlier the Chicago office’s Broker Dealer Examinations Group. He joined the Broker Dealer Exam Program as an Assistant Regional Director in 2007, where he led some of the Commission’s largest and most complex sales practice and market structure exams of regulated entities.

Before joining the SEC’s EXAMS program, Mr. Gregus spent 14 years in the Division of Enforcement, where he served as an Assistant Regional Director directing notable investigations and prosecutions of complex fraud and regulatory matters.

Mr. Gregus received his Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, with highest honors, for which he was also named to the Bronze Tablet, and his Juris Doctor, magna cum laude, from the University of Illinois.

Ms. Horton has been an Associate Regional Director of the Investment Adviser/Investment Company (IA/IC) examination program in the Chicago Regional Office since 2020. She joined the SEC's Chicago office in 2004 as an accountant and was later an Exam Manager and an Assistant Regional Director in the Chicago IA/IC examination program. She earned her bachelor's degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and master's degree from DePaul University.

Ms. Pyszka has served as an Associate Regional Director for Enforcement in the Chicago office since 2017. She began her SEC service in 1997 as a staff attorney and later served in the positions of branch chief, senior trial counsel, and as an Assistant Director in the Chicago office and the Enforcement Division’s Market Abuse Unit. Ms. Pyszka earned her bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and her law degree from the University of Illinois College of Law.