SEC Awards Whistleblower $30M Under Dodd-Frank Act, Sets Record

On September 22, 2014, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced that it expects to award more than $30 million to a whistleblower who provided information that led to a successful SEC fraud enforcement action. The award is the highest whistleblower payment under the SEC's three-year-old Dodd-Frank whistleblower program. According to the SEC, the final award will range from $30 million to $35 million, and is the fourth payment made to a whistleblower living in a foreign country. The previous high SEC whistleblower payment, announced in October 2013, was $14 million. In a written statement, SEC Enforcement Director Andrew Ceresney said, "This whistleblower came to us with information about an ongoing fraud that would have been very difficult to detect. This record-breaking award sends a strong message about our commitment to whistleblowers and the value they bring to law enforcement." The SEC's whistleblower program was established under the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010. Under the program, the SEC rewards "high-quality, original information" that results in enforcement actions exceeding $1 million. Awards can range from 10 to 30 percent of the sanctions collected by the SEC. The whistleblower payments are funded by an investor protection fund financed through enforcement actions. The SEC has anonymity protection rules preventing it from disclosing the identities of the whistleblower or the enforcement action.