The first half of 2024 saw a number of notable developments across the white collar and regulatory enforcement arena. In light of these trends, discussed more fully below, corporate counsel, compliance professionals, and board members should consider:
- Whether the confidentiality provisions in their companies’ employment agreements, consulting agreements, NDAs and similar agreements contain appropriate carve outs for communicating with regulators.
- The effectiveness of their own whistleblower programs, in light of the potential for increased whistleblower activity (and potential scrutiny of those programs) generally.
- Whether their anti-corruption training and third-party diligence processes are capturing potential sanctions and export control violations, in addition to more traditional FCPA compliance.
- What types of trading are prohibited by their companies’ insider trading policies and whether the scope of these prohibitions is being adequately explained in training.
- Whether their executives and employees are trained and advised on the requirements to enter into any 10b5-1 plan, in light of recent SEC and DOJ activity in this area.
- The adequacy of any AI-related disclosures they make to investors, in light of the potential for increased SEC scrutiny in this area.
DOJ and CFTC Emphasize Incentivizing and Protecting Whistleblowers
Since being enacted as part of the Dodd-Frank Act in 2010, the SEC’s whistleblower program has revolutionized securities enforcement investigations and paid out hundreds of millions in dollars awards.
