San Francisco Regional Director Erin E. Schneider to Leave Agency

The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced that Erin E. Schneider, the Director of the San Francisco Regional Office since 2019, is leaving the agency after more than 17 years of service. Monique C. Winkler will become the office’s Acting Regional Director when Ms. Schneider departs at the end of this month.

“I thank Erin for her dedication and service to the SEC over the last 17 years,” said SEC Chair Gary Gensler. “The enforcement and examinations functions of our San Francisco Regional Office are crucial to our efforts to protect investors, and we have benefited greatly from Erin’s leadership. I’d also like to thank Monique for stepping up to serve as Acting Regional Director.”

“Erin has been an outstanding leader for the San Francisco office,” said Gurbir Grewal, the SEC’s Director of Enforcement. “Her tenure has been marked by a number of groundbreaking enforcement cases, especially in Silicon Valley, that will benefit investors for many years to come. The San Francisco office is well positioned to identify and confront the rapidly changing market dynamics that animate the region.”  

Ms. Schneider said, “I am incredibly grateful to the agency for the opportunity to work with such a talented group of people dedicated to public service. I especially want to thank the staff in the San Francisco office for their passion, resiliency, entrepreneurial spirit, and tireless efforts to protect investors and our markets even in times of great upheaval.” 

Ms. Schneider has been overseeing examinations and investigations into a broad range of SEC registrants and issuers as well as spearheading local initiatives across Northern California and the Pacific Northwest. Earlier in her SEC tenure, she served in the Asset Management Unit as an Assistant Director and then Associate Regional Director for Enforcement in the San Francisco office. She began as an enforcement staff attorney in 2005. Ms. Schneider received the SEC’s Ellen Ross Award in 2011 and the Chairman’s Award for the Protection of Main Street Investors in 2020.    

Ms. Winkler succeeded Ms. Schneider as the San Francisco office’s Associate Regional Director for Enforcement beginning in 2019. She previously was an Assistant Director in the Enforcement Division’s Public Finance Abuse Unit among other roles since joining the agency staff in 2008. Ms. Winkler earned her bachelor’s degree in psychology magna cum laude from Indiana University and her law degree from Vanderbilt University School of Law.