Faster payment to investors sought

The Securities and Exchange Commission has formed an office to quickly distribute financial penalties to wronged investors after government watchdogs said the agency wasn’t returning the money quickly enough.

The SEC’s Office of Collections and Distributions will pay out more than $5 billion the regulator has recovered from securities law violators, the agency said Tuesday.

Since gaining the authority under the Sarbanes-Oxley law to distribute financial penalties, the commission has given more than $3.5 billion to investors. Before the law was enacted in 2002, the SEC sent financial penalties collected from its enforcement actions to the U.S. Treasury.

Richard D’Anna, a former executive at Deutsche Bank’s Alex. Brown brokerage, was named director of the new SEC office, the agency said Tuesday. He will be responsible for ensuring that investors receive penalties paid by mutual funds, banks and insurers accused of violating securities laws.