During Ceresney’s four-year tenure, the SEC filed more than 2,850 enforcement actions and obtained judgments and orders totalling more than $13.8bn (£10.9bn, €12.9bn) in monetary sanctions.
The SEC also charged over 3,300 companies and over 2,700 individuals, including many chief executives, chief financial officers, and other senior corporate officers.
No reason was given for his departure.
Stephanie Avakian, deputy director of the SEC’s Enforcement Division, will become the acting director after Ceresney steps down.
SEC chair, Mary Jo White, who has also announced she is to leave, said: “Under Andrew’s strong leadership, the Enforcement Division took its already robust enforcement programme to an even higher level, achieving unprecedented results, including a record number of enforcement actions, first-of-their-kind cases and a first ever admissions policy for a civil law enforcement agency.”
Ceresney’s is the seventh high-profile SEC employee to announce plans to step down or retire since the middle of November.
Keith Higgins, director of the SEC’s Division of Corporation Finance, announced on Wednesday that he plans to leave the SEC in early January.
Chief economist and Division of Economic and Risk Analysis (DERA) director Mark Flannery will leave the agency by the end of December.
Matthew C. Solomon, chief litigation counsel for the SEC’s Enforcement Division, announced he was leaving the agency in early December.
Stephen Luparello, director of the Division of Trading and Markets, is also leaving the agency and is expected to step down by the first of the year. He was only named director of the office in February 2014.
Chief accountant James Schnurr intends to retire from the agency having only begun his tenure as the SEC’s chief accountant in October 2014.
