Liu v. Securities and Exchange Commission

Liu v. Securities and Exchange Commission
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued March 3, 2020 Decided June 22, 2020
Full case name	Charles C. Liu, et al., v. Securities and Exchange Commission
Docket no.	18-1501
Citations	591 U.S. 71 (more) 140 S. Ct. 1936
Case history
Prior	No. 16-00974-CJC(AGRx), 262 F.3d 957 (C.D. Ca 2017); affirmed, 754 Federal Appendix 505 (9th Cir 2018); cert. granted, 140 S. Ct. 451 (2019).
Holding
A disgorgement award that does not exceed a wrongdoer's net profits and is awarded for victims is equitable relief permissible under 15 U.S.C. § 78u(d)(5).
Court membership
Chief Justice John Roberts Associate Justices Clarence Thomas · Ruth Bader Ginsburg Stephen Breyer · Samuel Alito Sonia Sotomayor · Elena Kagan Neil Gorsuch · Brett Kavanaugh
Case opinions
Majority	Sotomayor, joined by Roberts, Ginsburg, Breyer, Alito, Kagan, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh
Dissent	Thomas
Laws applied
Securities Act of 1933

Liu v. Securities and Exchange Commission, 591 U.S. 71 (2020), is a US Supreme Court case related to disgorgement awards sought by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for fraudulent activities. The Court ruled in an 8–1 decision that such disgorgement awards can be awarded by the courts as equitable relief under the Securities Act of 1933, 15 U.S.C. § 78u(d)(5), but they are limited to the wrongdoer's net profits and must be awarded for victims.^[1]