For me, the year-end retrospectives have become a rite of passage. While there has been modest changes and trends in the enforcement arena, I am amazed each year at the pace at which compliance as a discipline and a profession continues to move forward. While there is much that is written about compliance and current or immediate trends, in reality, on the ground, compliance as...
Business operations can be riddled with inefficiencies. It is easy to spot them inside a company. The same rule applies to ethics and compliance programs. Given a specific global business configuration, ethics and compliance programs have to be designed efficiently to support the business. For some reason, a number of compliance programs have been built with two separate silos – one for trade compliance and...
Jessica Sanderson, Of Counsel, The Volkov Law Group, joins us for her initial posting on the False Claims Act. Jessica can be reached at [email protected]. On December 21, 2018, the Department of Justice (“DOJ”) released its Fraud statistics showing $2.8 billion recovery under the False Claims Act (“FCA”) for 2018.[1] While this number is staggering, fiscal year 2018 FCA recoveries were down more than ½...
In a December 2018 enforcement settlement, the SEC and Brazil’s Centrais Elétricas Brasileiras S.A. (“Eletrobras”) agreed to violating books and records and internal accounting controls requirements and paid a $2.5 million penalty. (Here). DOJ declined to prosecute Eletrobras. Eletrobas stock is traded on the New York Stock Exchange. The Brazilian government owns 51 percent of Eletrobras and appoints seven of eleven board members. The bribery...
As the Bible reminds us, “Beware of false prophets,” or in the compliance context, “Beware of false [measurements].” Compliance professionals have an obsession with benchmarking their compliance programs. Why are compliance officers so obsessed with such comparisons? Compliance is a function that, by definition, involves objective and subjective measurements. In its simplest form, compliance success is measured by the absence of a negative occurrence. Such...
Employee hotlines are – sorry about this – a “hot” topic these days in compliance. NAVEX Global’s recent study (here) confirmed the importance of an effective hotline system. Companies that implement robust and widely-used internal reporting systems are more effective in identifying and responding to potential problems. Such an impact improves overall business performance as measured by return on assets, fewer material lawsuits, lower litigation...
The Volkov Law Group is pleased to announce the addition of Jessica Sanderson to the firm. Jessica has a wealth of compliance and enforcement defense experience. We look forward to introducing her to new and existing clients. Jessica Sanderson, Of Counsel, has more than 20 years of experience in a number of areas, including complex civil litigation, white-collar defense and regulatory and securities enforcement under...
Polycom, Inc., a U.S. communication technology company, which was recently acquired by Plantronics, earned a DOJ declination and entered into an SEC settlement for FCPA violations in China. DOJ released a declination letter (here); and the SEC issued an administrative order (here). Polycom earned the declination under the FCPA Corporate Enforcement Policy. Polycom identified the misconduct and voluntarily disclosed to the government; Polycom conducted a...
On December 19, 2018, the SEC announced settlements with two former senior executives of Panasonic Avionics Corporation. In April 2018, Panasonic Avionics settled FCPA charges with the Justice Department and the SEC and agreed to pay $280 million. (Here) Paul Margis (Here), the former CEO, and Takeshi Uonaga (Here), the former CFO, agreed to pay $75,000, and $50,000 respectively, to settle books and records and...
The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC) rarely backs down. Recently, in response to significant ownership and governance changes, OFAC removed three Russian companies, EN+ Group (EN+), UC Rusal plc (Rusal), and JSC EuroSibEnergo (ESE) from the sectoral sanctions list. (Here). OFAC’s decision to remove the three companies capped the efforts of Russian oligarch, Oleg Daripaska, to modify his ownership and control of...
