Jay Clayton

Walter Joseph "Jay" Clayton III (born July 11, 1966) is an American attorney who has been the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York since April 2025. Clayton served as the chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission from May 4, 2017, until December 23, 2020. 

From 1993 to 1995, Clayton clerked for Judge Marvin Katz of the District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

After being a summer associate at the firm in the summer of 1992, Clayton joined Sullivan & Cromwell full-time in October 1995 and became a partner in January 2001. At Sullivan & Cromwell, Clayton was a member of the firm's management committee and co-managing partner of the firm's General Practice Group. He specialized in mergers and acquisitions transactions and capital markets offerings and represented prominent Wall Street firms, including Goldman Sachs. He served as an adviser to numerous companies regarding issues related to the SEC, Federal Reserve, Department of Justice, and other agencies.

He has also helped multiple corporations raise money through initial public offerings, including Alibaba Group, Ally Financial, Och-Ziff Capital Management, Oaktree Capital Management, Blackhawk Network Holdings, and Moelis & Company. During the 2008 financial crisis, Clayton advised Bear Stearns in its fire sale to JPMorgan Chase in 2007, Barclays Capital in the purchase of Lehman Brothers' assets following their bankruptcy, and Goldman Sachs in connection with the investment by Berkshire Hathaway.

Clayton disclosed to the U.S. Office of Government Ethics that his other corporate clients had included TeliaSonera AB, Ally Financial, Deutsche Bank, UBS, Volkswagen, SoftBank Group, The Weinstein Company, Pershing Square Capital Management, and Valeant Pharmaceuticals. Clayton's individual clients included Ocwen's former head William Erbey, Paul Tudor Jones, former attorney general of Ireland Peter Sutherland, CDW founder Michael Krasny and LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman.