As securities regulators grapple with the ever-growing importance of data and technology to the financial industry, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) has hired its first chief data scientist to help drive increased use of artificial intelligence (AI).
The U.S. derivatives regulator named Ted Kaouk as its chief data officer and director of the agency’s division of data, while John Coughlan will become the CFTC’s first-ever chief data scientist.
The agency said Kaouk will lead its data integration initiatives and help facilitate informed policy decisions, while Coughlan will expand the agency’s use of AI to enhance derivatives market oversight.
Coughlan has been with the CFTC for eight years in various roles, including as an analyst in the market oversight division, where he built the CFTC’s first machine learning model to detect anomalies in regulatory transactions data, the agency noted.
Prior to joining the CFTC, Coughlan worked at Booz Allen Hamilton, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, and the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.
Kaouk was previously chief data officer at both the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), and at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. He began his career as an officer in the U.S. Navy.