The SEC is expanding its New York enforcement and examination teams, but that may not mean more scrutiny for mutual fund firms. Reuters' Matthew Goldstein and Svea Herbst-Bayliss report that George Canellos, head of the SEC's New York office since June, revealed that he plans to increase his team by eight percent in 2010, adding 18 enforcement staff to a team of about 150 and adding 15 examinations staff to a team of about 210, as part of the SEC's effort to go after brokerages and hedge funds in the wake of the Bernie Madoff scandal.

"We have obtained the funds to do more hiring," Canellos reportedly said at the Reuters Private Equity and Hedge Funds Summit this week in New York. "It [the financial crisis] does allow us to take advantage of great opportunities that haven't always been available."

"We want to be able to talk shop with the hedge fund managers and private equity managers and make sure that the industry is able to get the message from a unit in a very direct way," added Bruce Karpati, co-chief of the new SEC asset management unit under SEC enforcement chief Robert Khuzami. (Karpati's unit focus on hedge funds, investment advisors, mutual funds and private equity funds.) 

Edited by: Neil Anderson, Managing Editor


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