{"id":11014,"date":"2026-06-21T20:34:00","date_gmt":"2026-06-21T20:34:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/cftc-announces-two-significant-whistleblower-awards-under-revamped-program\/"},"modified":"2026-06-21T20:34:00","modified_gmt":"2026-06-21T20:34:00","slug":"cftc-announces-two-significant-whistleblower-awards-under-revamped-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/cftc-announces-two-significant-whistleblower-awards-under-revamped-program\/","title":{"rendered":"CFTC Announces Two Significant Whistleblower Awards Under Revamped Program"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\n The CFTC, under its revamped whistleblower program, announced this month its largest award to date and its first award to a foreign resident.\u00a0 Both whistleblowers were insiders of the penalized entity.<\/p>\n

On July 12, the CFTC announced an approximately $30 million award to an \u201cinsider\u201d who voluntarily provided \u201ckey information that led to a successful enforcement action.\u201d\u00a0 The award is the largest whistleblower award ever made by the CFTC.\u00a0 CFTC Chairman J. Christopher Giancarlo stated in a press release:\u00a0 \u201cWe hope that an award of this magnitude will incentivize whistleblowers to come forward with valuable information and provide notice to market participants that individuals are reporting quality information about violations of the Commodity Exchange Act [CEA].\u201d<\/p>\n

On July 16, the CFTC announced its first award to a foreign resident, who received more than $70,000.\u00a0 The associated order stated that this awardee \u201cwas involved in the CEA violations at issue\u201d but \u201cit was unlikely that he\/she acted with scienter, as he\/she was a junior-level employee in a foreign nation given instruction by his\/her employer.\u201d\u00a0 James McDonald, Director of the CFTC\u2019s Division of Enforcement stated:\u00a0 \u201cThis award is significant because it signals to whistleblowers around the world that anyone with information about potential violations of the Commodity Exchange Act can participate in the CFTC\u2019s Whistleblower Program.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Dodd-Frank Act of 2010 empowered both the CFTC and SEC to grant to eligible whistleblowers awards in amounts between 10 and 30 percent of the ultimate monetary sanctions imposed on a regulated entity, provided that the whistleblower\u2019s information led to a successful enforcement action that resulted in a sanction of at least $1 million.\u00a0 The CFTC program historically has been significantly less prolific than the one administered by the SEC.\u00a0 In May 2017, however, the CFTC implemented significant changes to \u201cstrengthen and enhance\u201d its whistleblower program.\u00a0 According to a recent statement by Chairman Giancarlo, the whistleblower program has now \u201cbecome an integral component in the agency\u2019s enforcement arsenal.\u201d\u00a0 Similarly, Enforcement Director McDonald stated:\u00a0 \u201cWhistleblower submissions have become a significant part of our enforcement program, allowing us to pursue violations we might otherwise have been unable to detect.\u00a0 That\u2019s one reason why we\u2019ve worked hard to expand our Whistleblower Program, including by increasing the protections afforded to whistleblowers that come forward.\u00a0 I expect the Whistleblower Program to contribute even more substantially to our enforcement efforts going forward.\u201d\n <\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The CFTC, under its revamped whistleblower program, announced this month its largest award to date and its first award to a foreign resident.\u00a0 Both whistleblowers were insiders of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11015,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1444,2052,5994,1187,8167,346,997],"class_list":["post-11014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lawyers","tag-announces","tag-awards","tag-cftc","tag-program","tag-revamped","tag-significant","tag-whistleblower"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11014"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11014\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}