It’s no wonder the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently issued new rules asserting its right to limit large whistleblower awards, because the agency handed them out in fiscal year 2020 at an unprecedented pace.
On Wednesday, the agency announced whistleblower awards of $22 million and $7 million to two tipsters. The whistleblower who earned $22 million was the first to alert the SEC to the wrongdoing and led the agency to open an investigation, then provided “substantial, ongoing assistance” to investigators, the SEC said in a press release. The second tipster provided “additional, valuable information” on the same wrongdoing, the SEC said. Four smaller whistleblower awards worth almost $5 million were also later announced Wednesday.
