Whistleblowers "should expect a more adversarial process—and prepare accordingly," Gesmer Updegrove partner Braeden Anderson wrote in a note to clients.
A powerful incentive to rat out corporate misconduct waned in the latest fiscal year, as payouts under the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's Whistleblower Program fell to their lowest level in six years, a Law.com analysis found.
The SEC paid whistleblowers about $60 million in the fiscal year ended Sept. 30—a low not seen since 2019. In fiscal 2023, the agency awarded $600 million—the most since the program launched in 2011—and in fiscal 2024 it handed out $255 million. (See year-by-year data at the bottom of this story).
Law.com tallied the latest year's payouts by reviewing <a>nearly 150 award determinations
. Because the agency redacted dollar amounts in a handful of the documents and because some of the records might have been duplicative, the SEC might report a somewhat higher or lower 2025 payout when it submits the program's annual report to Congress in the coming weeks.
In addition to handing out dramatically less money overall in fiscal 2025, individual rewards were smaller. The <a>largest was $12 million
. That compares with <a>$98 million split between two whistleblowers
in fiscal 2024.
Constantine Cannon attorney Gordon Schnell, whose legal team has wrangled more than $1 billion in government and whistleblower recoveries, said he is concerned that the SEC may be prioritizing low-value...
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