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Listen to the Replay of the Recent Clausematch Webinar: Policy Management, Governance and Leveraging Your Culture of Compliance

Last week, I participated in an interesting webinar, sponsored by Clausematch, on Policy Management, Governance and Leveraging your Culture of Compliance. Joining me on the webinar was Willem Wellinghoff, Chief Compliance Officer, and Jeff Weiss, EVP at Clausematch. I hope you have a chance to listen to the replay. The discussion was interesting. The webinar replay is here. The slides can be downloaded here.

Episode 199 — Jonathan Marks, Baker Tilly, and Michael Volkov Review the SEC’s Under Armour Case, Accounting Fraud, and Revenue Recognition Issues

Under Armour settled its long-pending SEC investigation by agreeing to pay $9 million surrounding misleading statements and practices relating to its revenue growth and uncertainties as to future growth. As part of the settlement, the SEC declined to bring charges against its CEO, Kevin Plank, and its CFO, David Bergman. The Justice Department inquiry appears to have lost steam since the middle of last year, and...

First American Financial Corporation Settles SEC Case for $487,616 for Cybersecurity Data Breach and Disclosure Failures

The Securities and Exchange Commission is gaining traction in the enforcement of cybersecurity and disclosure requirements.  The SEC has a lot on its plate these days – ESG, cybersecurity, and the traditional mix of enforcement cases.  While the new Chairman has been chomping at the bit, he stumbled out of the gate in his selection of a new enforcement director, Alex Oh, who eventually resigned...

Contech Engineered Pleads Guilty and Agrees to Pay $8.5 Million for Bid-Rigging and Fraud

The Antitrust Division has pushed bid-rigging and price-fixing prosecutions of government contractors.  It is long overdue – fraud enforcement has uncovered a number of bid-rigging and price-fixing schemes among government contractors.  To focus on this enforcement priority, DOJ created the Procurement Collusion Strike Force, which was initiated in November 2019, and consists of a multi-agency task force designed to uncover antitrust price-fixing schemes. The case...

Corruption Crime & Compliance: Subscribe to Blog and Podcast

Corruption, Crime & Compliance offers both blog postings and fresh podcasts on important legal and compliance topics. To make your life a little easier, we offer a subscription service so that you receive convenient notices of new blog postings and podcast episodes. Here are the subscription links: Apple Podcasts | Android | Email | Google Podcasts | Stitcher |  Corruption, Crime & Compliance also maintains an email subscription feature. You can sign up on the...

1 MDB Corruption Scandal Ripples with Superseding Indictment of Jho Low and Former Rapper “Pras’ Michael for Back-Channel Attempt to Close 1MDB Prosecution

The scandal emanating from the 1 Malaysia Development Berhad fund (1MDB) continues to ripple through criminal law enforcement and criminal prosecutions.  Just to remind everyone, last year’s most significant FCPA enforcement case resulted in a $3 billion settlement with the Justice Department, the SEC and other agencies. Tim Leissner, the former Goldman Sachs Southeast Asia Chairman pleaded guilty to conspiracy to money laundering and FCPA...

Should CCOs Take Responsibility for the “New” ESG Function?

Forgive me for going out on a limb here.  But this issue is fairly obvious.  A simple question: Should the Chief Compliance Officer be responsible for the Environmental, Social and Governance function? I have to set it up this way to give the dogmatic, binary, yes or no, answer, and then continue to outline a more nuanced discussion of the relationship between CCO and the...

Episode 198 — The Biden Administration Announces Anti-Corruption Battle as a National Security Interest

In a far-reaching action, the Biden Administration elevated the global fight against corruption as a national security interest. In an Executive Memorandum, the Biden Administration made a strong statement against corruption, citing the devastating impact that corruption has on democratic institutions, democratic governments, economic development, and other public interest objectives. The Administration launched a robust inter-agency review of the anti-corruption battle, including increased international cooperation,...

LRN’s 2021 Ethics and Compliance Report — the Impact of COVID-19

LRN’s annual Ethics and Compliance Program Effectiveness Report is an important yearly event.  The report is often filled with important trends and observations.  For compliance officers, there is always important trends and information to review. As we know, however, 2021 was no ordinary year.  Instead, for many companies, the challenges of COVID-19 split the year into two – and LRN has followed suit.  Its first...

NAVEX Global Incident Management Study Confirms Impact of COVID-19 on Employee Reporting

NAVEX Global produces a number of important compliance program reports.  NAVEX Global always has played an important thought-leadership role in the ethics and compliance field. NAVEX Global’s annual Incident Management Benchmark Report provides important data on employee engagement and reporting.  A copy of the Report can be downloaded here. The Report is based on NAVEX Global’s massive incident reporting database connected to its hotline reporting...