For many years, Michael Sullivan of our firm and his colleague Jim Breen have organized the “Whistleblower Law Symposium.” It has consistently received high marks from participants. This year’s Symposium will be available either in-person or online on Wednesday, March 13, starting at 815 am EDT. It offers 7.5 CLE…
After reporting on the SEC’s investigation and findings of 20 years of “misstatements” by the LDS Church and Ensign Peak Advisors, Inc., the Wall Street Journal‘s Jonathan Weil again reports on facts revealed by our SEC and IRS whistleblower submissions on behalf of our client, David Nielsen. Mr. Nielsen exposed…
In this week of new bank bailouts (following Silicon Valley Bank’s), a bipartisan group of five Senators has urged common sense improvements to the SEC Whistleblower laws. These Senators emphasize the “crucial role of whistleblowers” in protecting both investors and taxpayer funds. The SEC Whistleblower Reform Act of 2023, co-sponsored…
As the anxious public yearns for vaccines, treatments, and protections from the virus, the SEC has warned of a “substantial potential for fraud relating to COVID-19. The SEC’s enforcement actions against 23 companies are just the start, as more fraud will undoubtedly be uncovered. Whistleblowers are critical to the SEC’s…
The SEC Whistleblower Program authorized in 2010’s Dodd-Frank law has greater significance because the SEC and the Justice Department share jurisdiction over Foreign Corrupt Practices Act cases. Today, SEC Director of Enforcement Robert Khuzami and Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer released the “Resource Guide to the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices…
When the SEC debated in 2011 requiring “internal” reporting within companies as a prerequisite to filing an SEC Whistleblower claim under Dodd-Frank, business interests howled that any other rule would “destroy” compliance programs. Never mind that the vast majority of whistleblowers have always raised concerns about illegal conduct internally before…
The final whistleblower rules of the Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) are being announced now at a CFTC open meeting. Like the SEC, the CFTC has rejected any provision that whistleblowers be required first to report internally the violations in question, but will treat internal reporting as a “positive” consideration…
The SEC Whistleblower Program encompasses not only classic securities violations, but also violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”), a topic we have followed closely. This past week, the SEC filed and settled an FCPA case against Armor Holdings, Inc., and collected more than $5.6 million, while the Department…
The suspense over the final SEC whistleblower rules ended with the SEC’s release of its final whistleblower rules last week. The CFTC is to follow suit soon in announcing its own commodities whistleblower rules. We have followed the SEC rules’ development, after being part of the small group of pro-whistleblower…
Just as we have followed closely the development of the IRS Whistleblower program since Congress authorized it in December 2006, we are watching the birth of the new SEC Whistleblower program. In 2010’s Dodd-Frank Financial Reform law, Congress mandated the creation of what could be the first meaningful SEC and…