Today’s SEC Whistleblower Award to Former Officer of Company Shows Flexibility of SEC Whistleblower Rules

The SEC announced today its first SEC Whistleblower award to a former company officer. The award of a half-million dollars was for “original, high-quality information about a securities fraud,” which resulted in an SEC enforcement action with sanctions of more than $1 million.

Typically, corporate officers, directors and other corporate fiduciaries are not eligible for SEC Whistleblower awards when they learn of fraud through employee reports. The SEC built in flexibility in its rules, however, when the officer waits “more than 120 days after other responsible compliance personnel possessed the information and failed to adequately address the issue.” Otherwise, frauds that a dishonest company refuses to address might otherwise go unreported.

We have followed the new SEC Whistleblower Program since the Senate staff consulted us in its drafting of the SEC whistleblower provisions of the 2010 Dodd-Frank law. We represent SEC and CFTC whistleblowers in claims that concern frauds sometimes as large as $1 billion.

This is the fifteenth whistleblower compensated by the SEC, with awards now approaching $50 million.

Congratulations to the SEC’s Sean McKessy for continuing to develop this important SEC Whistleblower Program.

The SEC’s press prelease can be found here.