Katz Banks Kumin partner Lisa J. Banks and associate Sam Kramer co-authored an article on Corporate Compliance Insights on July 6, 2016 entitled, “The Increased Prominence and Maturation of SEC and CFTC Whistleblower Programs.” In the article, the authors discussed how “bounty programs” have led to the dramatic growth of both the SEC’s and CFTC’s whistleblower programs. These bounty programs provide financial rewards to whistleblowers who provide information that allows the government to recover money lost to financial fraud.  According to the authors, both the CFTC and SEC programs have flourished under this incentive structure, allowing them to recover hundreds of millions of dollars from enforcement actions that were brought based on by whistleblower tips. Though the SEC’s program is significantly larger than the CFTC’s, both programs have successfully incentivized those with information about fraud to come forward with crucial information which has allowed the government to enforce federal securities laws.