Tips from whistleblowers to the Securities and Exchange Commission have increased significantly since the Wall Street reform law was enacted last year, an agency official said on Friday.

The number of high-value tips on fraud and other violations of securities law numbered about two dozen a year before the law. But since July, the agency has sometimes been receiving one or two a day, Thomas Sporkin, chief of the SEC's Office of Market Intelligence, told the SEC Speaks event sponsored by the Practising Law Institute.

Whistleblowers who provide original information about large frauds could net as much as 30 percent of the penalties and recovered funds collected by the SEC under the Dodd-Frank act.

Sometimes the whistleblower is from within the corporation, sometimes it's from a competitor, sometimes it's from a counterparty, sometimes it's even from a jilted spouse, Sporkin said.

He also said the tips are now often submitted by a lawyer on behalf of a whistleblower and are of good enough quality to allow the agency to begin following up quickly.

(Reporting by Dave Clarke, Editing by Tim Dobbyn)