DOJ and the SEC have provided unprecedented compliance guidance and information. DOJ has established itself as the preeminent leader in advancing ethics and compliance programs, best practices and innovations. No agency or global organization has had such a dramatic impact on the improvement of corporate compliance programs. To be sure, DOJ and the SEC have a two-prong strategy – first and most important, DOJ and...
The Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission had another record year of enforcement. In fact, the last four years of FCPA enforcement included two years of record enforcement – 2019 and 2020. After those two years, 2016, 2014, 2010 were larger enforcement years (as measured by total fines) than 2017 and 2018, the first two years of FCPA enforcement under the Trump Administration....
The Volkov Law Group wishes our clients, colleagues, subscribers, readers and friends and families a wonder, happy holiday season. We are grateful for your support and your friendship. While this has been a very difficult year, we look forward to a New Year filled with hope, recovery, and a bright path forward. Our blog will return after the New Year. Thank you again from all...
We all have been following the rapid growth of cryptocurrency and the creation of lucrative trading platforms. Cryptocurrency has earned the scrutiny of regulators and criminal prosecutors – not for run-of-the-mill fraud schemes, but for compliance with applicable anti-money laundering laws and regulations. Late in 2020, the Justice Department and the Commodities Futures Trade Commission (“CFTC”) slammed BitMEx and its principals with a coordinated criminal...
The United States continues to lag in corporate board diversity. Many corporate boards are dominated by white males. Progress on this issue has been slow. The number of women on Russell 3000 boards rose from 15 to 19 percent. Most of the increase occurred on boards of mid- and large-cap companies. In 2019, 45 percent of new board members were female and only 15 percent...
The internal controls provision in the FCPA statute has broad application to a variety of situations beyond foreign bribery. The Securities and Exchange Commission knows full well the power of the internal controls provision and has readily applied it in a variety of circumstances. One recent example is the SEC’s settlement with Andeavor LLC for failure to publicly disclose the status of its negotiations to...
The Trump Administration has focused on competition and the technology sector. First, the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division filed a monopolization case against Google. Last week, the Federal Trade Commission and 46 states filed a monopolization case against Facebook. These are two major antitrust cases. When the Biden Administration takes over, it will be interesting to monitor how DOJ and the FTC handle these two cases....
It is always interesting to watch the flow of risk management trends, particularly as they impact ethics and compliance issues. Financial companies have been the target of regulatory enforcement actions for risk management and control deficiencies. Citigroup and JP Morgan were two recent targets of banking regulatory enforcement actions. We will probably see a few more banks subject to regulatory enforcement actions. Apart from the...
The Justice Department is coming to the close of a record FCPA enforcement year despite the disruptions caused by the pandemic. The Vitol case also represents the first parallel prosecution involving the Commodities Futures Trading Commission. Aside from these points, there are a number of valuable lessons from the case: High-Risk Energy Trading Markets: Commodity trading markets presents significant corruption risks. While such trading operations...
Vitol’s bribery scheme stretched into three separate countries – Brazil, Ecuador and Mexico — and was carried out over a ten-year period. The Statement of Facts is instructive in describing the means by which Vitol used false documentation and financial arrangements involving offshore accounts, shell companies and correspondent banking transactions, Brazil: Confidential Information For a nine-year period, 2005 to 2014, Vitol paid more than $8...
