On November 14, 2023, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) announced its enforcement results for fiscal year 2023, boasting increases in enforcement and financial remedies across all of its programs. The SEC filed a staggering 784 enforcement actions, obtained orders for nearly $5 billion in financial remedies, and distributed nearly $1 billion to harmed investors.
The SEC’s most notable results, however, came from its Whistleblower Program: In fiscal year 2023, the SEC issued whistleblower awards totaling nearly $600 million, the most ever awarded in one ...
Under the Biden Administration, the Securities and Exchange Commission has aggressively enforced its Whistleblower Program. As we previously reported here and here, the SEC has increased its focus on employers’ agreements or procedures that it contends interfere with employee access to the SEC. More recently, the SEC has for the first time turned its attention toward employer compliance programs with draconian results for employers whose internal compliance efforts do not pass muster. Specifically, on February 3, 2023, the SEC announced a dizzying $35 million fine against Activision Blizzard, Inc. (“Activision”), a video game developer, largely for failing to implement an effective compliance system to process and track workplace misconduct complaints. Activision’s fine also included a violation for including a “Notice Clause” in the separation agreement template that it used between 2016 and 2021. We discuss each violation below and what this means for SEC-regulated employers going forward.
The Securities and Exchange Commission’s Whistleblower Program under the Biden administration has picked up where it left off under President Obama, aggressively enforcing Rule 21F-17(a) against employers whose policies may impede employees from communicating with the SEC. On June 23, 2021, the SEC fined Guggenheim Securities, LLC (“Guggenheim”) for maintaining a policy that it contended impeded potential whistleblowers from communicating with the SEC by requiring employees to obtain permission before reporting securities violations. Even though the SEC was unaware of any instances in which a Guggenheim employee was prevented from reporting a potential securities law violation or in which Guggenheim acted to enforce the policy, the SEC nevertheless found that the company had violated Rule 21F-17(a).
Recently, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s (“SEC”) Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations (“OCIE”) issued a Risk Alert to provide broker-dealers with guidance on examinations regarding regulation Best Interest (“Reg BI”). Reg BI requires that when broker-dealers make a recommendation regarding securities to a retail customer it must act in the best interest of the customer, without placing its own financial or other interest ahead of the retail customer’s interest. The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (“FINRA”) also ...
On August 20, 2019, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) charged Mosaic Capital, LLC, formerly known as AOC Securities, LLC (“AOC”), and its CEO with failing to adequately supervise an employee who engaged in securities fraud. Pursuant to the SEC Orders, AOC and its CEO were ordered to pay penalties of $250,000 and $40,000, respectively. The SEC’s actions serve as a reminder to broker-dealers—and members of firm management—of the potential for liability based on the actions of a self-dealing employee, and the need to guard against such activities.
The ...
Featured on Employment Law This Week: The Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) recently issued the largest whistleblower awards under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (“Dodd-Frank”) in history.
Affirming the payout of over $49 million to two whistleblowers and over $33 million to a third for information that led to successful securities law prosecutions. Dodd-Frank established the whistleblower "bounty" program in 2010, and the SEC reports that it has awarded more than $262 million so far, to 53 whistleblowers.
Watch the segment ...
Twice in the past two weeks, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC” or “Commission”) issued a cease-and-desist order settling proceedings against companies for using confidentiality and waiver of claims provisions in employee separation or severance agreements that violate an SEC rule promulgated after passage of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (“Dodd-Frank”). The rule in question is designed to encourage and allow whistleblowers to freely disclose information to the SEC without impediments and ensure that they are (and ...
Last week, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s Office of the Whistleblower, created in 2011 pursuant to the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010, released its mandated report to Congress on operations for Fiscal Year 2014, ending on September 30, 2014. A number of interesting facts, statistics and developments were reported. Here is a selection of particularly relevant highlights:
- FY 2014 was the most active year yet in terms of whistleblower awards. The SEC has made awards to 14 whistleblowers since inception of the program, including 9 in ...
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