What 1934 US law created the Securities and Exchange Commission?

The Securities Exchange Act of 1934 created the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the law on June 6, 1934, during the federal response to the financial turmoil of the Great Depression.

The Act primarily governs secondary-market trading: transactions in securities such as stocks and bonds after their original issuance. It also established requirements for securities exchanges, broker-dealers, reporting companies, and market conduct. Section 4 created the SEC and gave it a central role in enforcing federal securities laws.

A frequent mix-up is the Securities Act of 1933. The 1933 law focuses mainly on new securities offerings in the primary market, while the 1934 Act addresses trading and oversight in the secondary market. Dodd–Frank and Sarbanes–Oxley are later reforms that amended or supplemented the regulatory framework; neither created the SEC.