⁍ The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday will finalize new conditions for its whistleblower bounty program.
⁍ The changes aim to ensure that eligible whistleblowers automatically get the current maximum 30% award of the resulting fine.
⁍ The new conditions would give staff more discretion to dish out rewards under the program taking into consideration a number of new factors.
– The SEC will on Wednesday finalize new conditions for its whistleblower bounty program, which will result in rewards being issued faster and some rewards rising in value, agency officials said. They added that the changes aim to ensure that eligible whistleblowers automatically get the current maximum 30% award of the resulting fine, a presumption that is not the case under current rules. The new conditions, first proposed by the agency in 2018, would give staff more discretion to dish out rewards under the program taking into consideration a number of new factors. These include the significance of the tipster’s information; the level of assistance they offer the SEC; the severity of the alleged misconduct; and the whistleblower’s level of involvement in internal compliance systems. Even with these new considerations, SEC Chair Jay Clayton told reporters that he expected most rewards to ‘stay the same or increase, and to be able to issue them faster,’ per Reuters. Created following the 2009 financial crisis, the program allows the SEC to reward tipsters whose original information leads to a penalty exceeding $1 million with between 10% and 30% of the fine. Wednesday’s new rule would presume that a tipster is eligible for the maximum 30%, pending these considerations.
Source: https://www.reuters.com/article/usa-sec-whistleblowers/update-1-us-sec-to-vote-on-expanded-tipster-program-to-consider-more-bounties-but-with-heightened-conditions-idUSL2N2GK0YF