CFTC Announces Four Whistleblower Awards Totaling $4.5 Million to Seven Recipients

Release Number 8974-24

CFTC Announces Four Orders Granting Whistleblower Awards – Marking the Most in a Single Day

September 23, 2024

Washington, D.C. — The Commodity Futures Trading Commission today announced awards totaling approximately $4.5 million for whistleblowers who, collectively, provided information that led to the success of multiple enforcement actions, brought by the CFTC and another authority. The four orders granting awards, to a total of seven whistleblowers, are the most the CFTC has issued on a single day.

The orders recognize the award recipients for their distinctive contributions:

• Four whistleblowers who, as victims of fraud, significantly contributed to the resolution of both a CFTC action and a related criminal action, providing insight into the broad scope of the misconduct and enabling the identification of additional victims.
• A separate whistleblower victim whose tip alerted the CFTC to a new fraud by a repeat offender, and whose ongoing assistance helped uncover additional evidence of misconduct that led to additional charges.
• A market participant whistleblower whose information led the CFTC to look into different conduct as part of an existing investigation, and which led directly to important evidence supporting the CFTC’s charges.
• A whistleblower who, as an employee with compliance/internal audit responsibilities, reported violations internally, then waited at least 120 days to contact the CFTC after no meaningful remedial action was taken. The award for this whistleblower is the second involving the CFTC’s 120-day safe harbor provision for such employees, following the first such award earlier this year [See CFTC Press Release No. 8878-24 ]. “Whistleblowers provide information from a variety of vantage points that helps preserve market integrity and fairness,” said Director of Enforcement Ian McGinley. “The multiple awards the CFTC is granting today serve as a warning to would-be wrongdoers across the markets we oversee that anyone may blow the whistle on their misconduct.”

“Today’s awards illustrate the CFTC’s Whistleblower Program is open to nearly anyone who voluntarily provides original information about a violation, including victims, witnesses, insiders, market participants, and employees,” said Whistleblower Office Director Brian Young. “Our Whistleblower Program remains committed to rewarding meritorious whistleblowers expeditiously for their information and assistance.”

With today’s four orders, the CFTC has issued 12 orders granting whistleblower awards this fiscal year, the most on record.

Whistleblower Office staff responsible for these awards are Counsel to the Director William Durbin, Senior Attorney Advisor Laurence Tai, and Attorney Advisor Rachel Anderson Rynders.

About the CFTC’s Whistleblower Program

The Whistleblower Program was created under Section 748 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010. Since issuing its first award in 2014, the CFTC has granted whistleblower awards amounting to approximately $380 million. Those awards are associated with enforcement actions that have resulted in monetary sanctions totaling nearly $3.2 billion. The CFTC issues awards related not only to the agency’s enforcement actions, but also in connection with related actions brought by other domestic or foreign regulators, if certain conditions are met.

The Commodity Exchange Act (CEA) provides confidentiality protections for whistleblowers. Regardless of whether the CFTC grants an award, the CFTC will not disclose any information that could reasonably be expected to reveal a whistleblower’s identity, except in limited circumstances. Consistent with this confidentiality protection, the CFTC will not disclose the name of the enforcement action in which the whistleblower provided information or the exact dollar amount of the award granted.

Whistleblowers may be eligible to receive between 10 and 30 percent of the monetary sanctions collected. All whistleblower awards are paid from the CFTC’s Customer Protection Fund, which was established by Congress, and is financed entirely through monetary sanctions paid to the CFTC by violators of the CEA. No money is taken or withheld from injured customers to fund the program.

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Anyone with information related to potential violations of the CEA or the CFTC’s rules and regulations can submit a tip electronically by filing a Form TCR (Tip, Complaint or Referral) online.

Visit Whistleblower.gov for more information about CFTC’s Whistleblower program.

-CFTC-

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RELATED LINKS

• No. 24-WB-09
• No. 24-WB-10
• No. 24-WB-11
• No. 24-WB-12