In reviewing FCPA bribery fact patterns, it is a rare occasion when a company’s CEO is at the epicenter of the criminal conspiracy. In the BIT Mining case, standing atop all of the actors is the CEO Zhengming Pan, Bit Mining’s former CEO and a Chinese national. DOJ had no choice but to charge Pan with a criminal FCPA conspiracy. Others could have been charged...
Earlier this year, Bit Mining and its CEO fell under the FCPA hammer. Bit Mining, formerly known as 500.com, resolved investigations with the Justice Department and the SEC for its corrupt scheme to bribe Japanese government officials. On the same date, DOJ announced the indictment of Zhengming Pan, Bit Mining’s former CEO and a Chinese national, for FCPA violations. BIT Mining entered into a three-year...
In one of the more notable enforcement actions of 2024, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) recently imposed a $1,104,408 civil penalty on a U.S. person for 75 separate violations of the Iranian Transactions and Sanctions Regulations (“ITSR”). The underlying violations, which occurred from 2019 to 2022, involved the purchase, renovation, and operation of a hotel on the Caspian...
By: Daniela Melendez, Associate at The Volkov Law Group, and Alex Cotoia, Regulatory Compliance Manager. Daniela can be reached at [email protected] and Alex can be reached out at [email protected]. The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) recently settled with American Life Insurance Company (“ALICO”), a Delaware-based subsidiary of MetLife, Inc., for $178,421, addressing apparent violations of the Iranian Transactions and Sanctions Regulations (“ITSR”)....
In an interesting political twist, the difference in approaches to antitrust enforcement between Democrat and Republican Administrations has been narrowing. It used to be that the difference in party control of the Antitrust Division and the Federal Trade Commission would have a significant impact on enforcement priorities. That gap is definitely changing and reflects growing agreement in the public in preventing anti-competitive conduct. Much of...
Happy Thanksgiving to our clients, friends, colleagues, and family!! We hope you have a wonderful and restful holiday. With peace and gratitude, The Volkov Law Group PC
We continue to hear about the impact of apparent or real conflicts of interest — whether in government, in business, or in other organizations. It is an issue of significant importance. Within an organization, a perceived or real conflict of interest can undermine the very integrity of the organization and a specific person’s ability to act in a manner consistent with the organization’s interests. Scandals...
“Only when the tide goes out do you discover who’s been swimming naked.” — Warren Buffett You often hear chief compliance officers speak about benchmarking. CCOs often reveal their competitive streaks when they collect information about other companies’ compliance programs. It can easily come off as a little insecure. In fact, CCOs are seeking valuable information — trying to measure their company’s performance outside their...
The Justice Department’s record of FCPA enforcement in 2024 has been disappointing. With all of the hoopla and pronouncements surrounding the global war against corruption, DOJ suggested that enforcement in 2023 and 2024 would be robust. Instead, 2024 was a year of fizzles, fits and starts, and ultimately a slow year of FCPA enforcement. The future under the Trump Administration will be interesting. Based on...
We should all admit something (among many things) — reading through factual statements of bribery offenses, the facts all start to meld together. Criminals are not as ingenuous or creative as they think, and the schemes they employ are fairly straightforward. Let’s start with one profound grasp of the obvious — To pay bribes, criminals have to “steal” money from the company, that is, they...
