Finally, SEC Voting on Whistleblower Reforms

whistleblower

The Securities and Exchange Commission will vote next week on reforms to its whistleblower rewards program, more than two years after the reforms were first proposed, and which still have the potential to complicate your pursuit of a strong speak-up culture. The vote is scheduled for Wednesday, Sept. 2. In theory compliance professionals will be…

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Whistleblower Award to Compliance Officer

whistleblower

Some compliance professional out there just received a $450,000 whistleblower award from the Securities and Exchange Commission — apparently after that person took his or her concerns to management, was ignored, and then brought those concerns to the SEC instead.  The SEC announced the award on Monday. As usual, we don’t know many details. A…

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SEC Tees Up Whistleblower Reforms

whistleblower

At long last, the SEC seems ready to vote on reforms to its whistleblower awards program, a contentious proposal that would cap the size of large awards while giving the SEC more discretion to hand out smaller awards.  The commission has scheduled an open meeting for next Wednesday, Oct. 23, to review and presumably adopt…

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Big: Senators Intro Whistleblower Fix

pre-taliation

A bipartisan group of senators has introduced legislation to undo the damage of the Digital Realty Trust decision from the Supreme Court last year, which said that employee whistleblowers must first report their allegations to the SEC if they want to claim whistleblower protections under the Dodd-Frank Act. This legislation from the Senate follows similar…

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Whistleblower Fix Lurches Forward Again

hotline

More whistleblower protection news from Washington: the House has passed a bill to undo the damage of the Digital Realty Trust decision from the Supreme Court last year, which said that employees must first report their allegations to the SEC if they want to claim whistleblower protections under the Dodd-Frank Act. On Tuesday the House…

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Another SEC Award Favoring Compliance

whistleblower

The Securities and Exchange Commission handed out a $3 million whistleblower award on Monday to two whistleblowers who first tried to report and fix their firm’s misconduct internally — yet another sign that the SEC is at least trying to nudge whistleblowers to work with corporate compliance departments. In another twist, the SEC also waived…

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Oh Come On, CFTC…

compensation

Well this takes the whistleblowing cake: the Commodities & Futures Trading Commission is promoting its whistleblower program at a cryptocurrency conference in New York this week, complete with a booth in the hallway and free CFTC whistles handed out to attendees. The event is Consensus 2019, a conference hosted by news website Coindesk to discuss…

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Progress on Whistleblower Fix

pre-taliation

One step forward for compliance officers and effective whistleblowers: the House Financial Services committee has approved a bill to undo the damage of the Digital Realty Trust decision from the U.S. Supreme Court in 2018, which said that whistleblowers must first report their allegations to the SEC if they want to claim whistleblower protections. The…

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Whistleblower Award Boosted for Reporting Internally

whistleblower

News from the world of whistleblower awards: the Commodities & Futures Trading Commission awarded a $1.5 million “enhanced award” to some lucky person on Monday, because that whistleblower first tried to report his or her concerns internally. As always with whistleblower awards, we don’t know too many facts in the case. But Christopher Ehrman, head…

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$50M SEC Whistleblower Award

whistleblower

The Securities and Exchange Commission handed out two big whistleblower awards Tuesday that sent an unmistakable message to the employee whistleblowers about whom compliance officers worry so much: if you want a crack at that award, report to the agency promptly, and bring all the information you can. The headline is that the SEC spilt…

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