SEC 2017 Report to Congress: $160 Million in Total Awards; 83% of Whistleblowers First Reported Fraud to Employers

20th November 2017

The Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) recently released its 2017 Annual Report to Congress for its Whistleblower Program (“Report”). According to the Report, since the inception of the Whistleblower Program, the SEC has received tips from whistleblowers in 114 countries outside the United States. In FY 2017, the SEC’s Office of the Whistleblower (“OWB”) received submissions from whistleblowers in 72 foreign countries, with the highest number of tips, after the United States, coming from individuals located in the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia.

According to the Report, the SEC stated that about 62 percent of people who received whistleblower payouts to date were current or former employees of the company of which they reported concerns to the SEC. Of the award recipients who were current or former employees, almost 83% of them first raised their concerns internally to their supervisors or compliance personnel before reporting their concerns to the SEC.

Since the beginning of the Whistleblower Program, the SEC has made awards to 46 whistleblowers of approximately $160 million in connection with 37 covered actions and several related actions.