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- Peirce’s October 2 resignation precedes an academic appointment already announced by Regent in May.
- Her career spans SEC staff work, Senate Banking, financial-policy research and nearly nine years as a commissioner.
- Regent is adding that regulatory experience as digital assets become a larger part of securities-law education.
Hester Peirce is leaving the Securities and Exchange Commission, but not the field that defined nearly nine years of her career.
T minus 7 pic.twitter.com/LrudEdFcKG
— Hester Peirce (@HesterPeirce) September 25, 2026
The commissioner will resign effective October 2 before joining Regent University School of Law as an associate professor in November. The appointment was announced in May, making the move a planned transition from financial regulation into legal education rather than an abrupt departure from Washington.
At Regent, Peirce will arrive with an unusual résumé: she has worked inside the SEC as staff, advised a commissioner, worked on Capitol Hill and ultimately became a commissioner herself.
Peirce Has Seen the SEC From Both Sides of the Desk
Peirce joined the Commission in January 2018, but her experience with the agency began much earlier.
She previously worked as a staff attorney in the SEC’s Division of Investment Management before serving as counsel to Paul Atkins during his earlier tenure as an SEC commissioner.
Between those roles and her eventual appointment to the Commission, Peirce also served as senior counsel to the
Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs and conducted financial-market research at George Mason University’s Mercatus Center.
She holds a law degree from Yale Law School and previously clerked at the U.S. Court of Federal Claims.
That career path gives Regent a faculty member who has experienced securities policy at the staff, congressional, research and commissioner levels rather than from a single institutional position.
Crypto Turns Her Appointment Into a More Unusual Hire
Peirce’s move also comes as digital assets are becoming harder to separate from mainstream securities law.
During her SEC tenure, she became one of the agency’s most recognizable voices on crypto regulation, earning the industry nickname “Crypto Mom.”
Her 2020 Token Safe Harbor Proposal argued for a temporary regulatory framework under which development teams could work toward decentralization without immediately satisfying some federal securities-registration requirements.
The proposal itself did not become SEC policy.
But the underlying questions it addressed, including when a token is tied to an investment contract and when a network becomes sufficiently functional, remain central to the agency’s crypto work today.
That gives her academic appointment a practical dimension. Future securities lawyers will increasingly encounter questions involving tokenized securities, blockchain-based trading and digital-asset offerings alongside conventional securities doctrine.
Regent specifically cited securities regulation, financial markets, public policy and digital assets among the expertise Peirce brings to the university.
Her SEC Term Actually Ended Last Year
October 2 is Peirce’s resignation date, but it is not the scheduled expiration of her term.
Her second term formally expired in June 2025. Federal securities law allows an SEC commissioner whose term has expired to remain in office for a limited period while a successor has not qualified.
Peirce consequently continued serving through 2026 rather than leaving when the five-year term ended.
Her resignation letter now establishes the endpoint.
In the letter, dated September 21 and subsequently posted publicly, Peirce described her SEC service as the “honor of my professional lifetime” and expressed confidence in Chairman Paul Atkins, Commissioner Mark Uyeda and agency staff.
She announced the approaching departure on X with a much shorter message: “T minus 7.”
November Starts a Different Kind of Securities Career
Regent announced Peirce’s appointment months before she publicly set her SEC departure date.
The university said she will join its law faculty in November 2026 as an associate professor, alongside former senior government lawyer Gregory F. Jacob.
That makes the transition notable for reasons beyond the “Crypto Mom” label.
Peirce will move from helping interpret and shape securities regulation to teaching the legal framework behind it.
Her students will be studying an area she has encountered from almost every institutional angle available in Washington.
For Regent, the hire effectively moves nearly nine years of experience from the SEC’s commission table into its law-school classrooms.
