On March 8, Rostin Behnam, Chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), testified before the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, & Forestry. During his testimony, Behnam expressed his belief that the fund which finances the CFTC Whistleblower Program needs a “long-term fix.”
The CFTC Whistleblower Program offers monetary awards and anti-retaliation protections to individuals who voluntarily provide the agency with information on commodities fraud. Since the program was established in 2010, whistleblower tips have allowed the CFTC to recover over $1 billion from fraudsters. The program has in turn paid out over $330 million in whistleblower awards.
The program’s success has caused issues, however. The fund used to finance the program, the Consumer Protection Fund, is entirely financed through sanctions paid by commodity fraudsters. The Fund has a strict cap on how many sanctions may be deposited into the fund at once. According to whistleblower advocates, the Fund’s cap, which was instituted with the founding of the program in 2010, does not sufficiently accommodate the exponential growth of the program. Whistleblower advocates have thus called on Congress to pass legislation addressing the CFTC’s funding crisis.
In July 2021, President Biden signed a bipartisan bill which saved the CFTC Whistleblower Program from financial collapse. The CFTC Fund Management Act, sponsored by Senators Chuck Grassley (R-IA), Maggie Hassan (D-NH), Joni Ernst...
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