SEC’s 2016 Whistleblower Program Awards over $57 million - Tips Up 40%

6th December 2016

On November 15, 2016, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) released its Annual Report on the Dodd-Frank Whistleblower Program for the 2016 Fiscal Year (“FY”), which ended September 30, 2016.          

The report showed that since the beginning of the whistleblower program in August 2011, the SEC has awarded more than $111 million to 34 whistleblowers and that in FY 2016 alone, the SEC issued awards totaling over $57 million, which is more than all awards issued in the previous years combined.

According to the report, the ten highest awards made by the SEC to whistleblowers have each totaled more than $1 million, with the largest exceeding more than $30 million. FY 2016 also included six of the ten largest awards being made.

The report stated that the whistleblower program has had a transformative effect on the SEC’s enforcement program. The program has not only provided whistleblowers with protections and financial rewards, but it has also strengthened the SEC’s enforcement efforts and aided harmed investors. According to the report, due to the information and cooperation from whistleblowers, hundreds of millions of dollars have been returned to investors and has led to successful enforcement actions in which over $584 million in financial sanctions was ordered, including more than $346 million in disgorgement of ill-gotten gains and interest.

The report also highlighted that for each fiscal year since the inception of the whistleblower program, the SEC has received an increasing number of whistleblower tips, including 4,218 tips from all over the world in FY 2016, which is more than a 40% increase over the 3,001 tips reported in FY 2012, the first full year of available data.

A copy of the SEC’s FY 2016 report can be found here:

https://www.sec.gov/whistleblower/reportspubs/annual-reports/owb-annual-report-2016.pdf