FCPA 2020
United States Phase 4 Monitoring Report This report details the United States’ achievements and challenges in respect to implementation and enforcement of the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention, as well as progress made since the Phase 3 evaluation in 2010.
Resolving Foreign Bribery Cases with Non-Trial Resolutions The OECD issued a series of recommendations on how countries can fine-tune its efforts to combat foreign bribery. The organization’s report contains 13 case studies: 1) AgustaWestland S.p.A. and AgustaWestland Ltd (India) – 2014; 2) Biomet (Argentina, Brazil, China and Mexico) – 2012/2017; 3) Ballast Nedam and KPMG (Saudi Arabia and Suriname) – 2012 and 2013; 4) Nikuv (Lesotho) – December 2016; 5) Och-Ziff (Chad, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Libya, and Niger) – September 2016; 6) Odebrecht S.A (Central and Latin America and Africa) – 2016; 7)Rolls-Royce (Angola, Azerbaijan, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Iraq Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Thailand and Nigeria) – January 2017; 8) SBM Offshore (Brazil, Angola, Equatorial Guinea, Kazakhstan and Iraq) – 2014 and 2016; 9) Siemens AG (Asia, Africa, Europe, the Middle East and the Americas) – 2008; 10) Société Générale (Libya) – 2018; 11) Standard Bank (Tanzania) – 2015; 12) Telia Company AB (Uzbekistan) – 2017; and 13) VimpelCom (Uzbekistan) – February 2016., and also offers a rare glimpse into the current state of FCPA enforcement.
SEC Enforcement Actions: FCPA Cases Enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) continues to be a high priority area for the SEC. In 2010, the SEC’s Enforcement Division created a specialized unit to further enhance its enforcement of the FCPA, which prohibits companies issuing stock in the U.S. from bribing foreign officials for government contracts and other business.
The following is a list of the SEC’s FCPA enforcement actions listed by calendar year.
The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act Clearinghouse The FCPAC operates as a database, a repository of original source documents, and a supplier of analytics, providing users with detailed information relating to enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Department of Justice (DOJ) have charged hundreds of companies and individuals with FCPA violations and imposed billions of dollars in monetary sanctions since the statute’s enactment in 1977. U.S. authorities have intensified their efforts to abate corruption by increasing personnel, collaborating more closely with foreign governments and agencies, and offering mitigation credit to companies that self-disclose FCPA violations and cooperate with the government’s investigation.
Resource Guide to the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, Second Edition The U.S. government released the second edition of its Resource Guide to the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act in July 2020. The 2020 FCPA Guide continues to serve the main purposes of its previous edition and reflecting the increased volume of U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act investigations since 2012 and resulting litigation, the 2020 FCPA Guide also incorporates the DOJ’s and SEC’s interpretations of a number of important federal court decisions.
DOJ and SEC expect robust internal investigation, analysis, and remediation of misconduct (which is a new area of emphasis and consistent with DOJ’s recently issued Evaluation of Corporate Compliance Programs), and require appropriate funding, timely and thorough investigation, documentation of discipline and remediation, root cause analysis, and effective use of lessons learned.
Another new area of emphasis includes Compliance Expectations and Monitors. Companies should continue to enhance their risk-based compliance programs; DOJ and SEC continue to impose compliance monitors when there is pervasive misconduct and manipulation of the books and records or exploitation of an inadequate compliance program and inadequate strengthening and testing of compliance programs.
The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act: An Overview This document was prepared by the Congressional Research Service and issued on June 29, 2020
DOJ Issues New Guidance for Corporate Compliance Programs On June 1, 2020, the Criminal Division of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) issued updated guidance on the “Evaluation of Corporate Compliance Programs” (June 2020 Guidance). This update revises a previous version issued in April 2019. Both versions are intended to “assist prosecutors in making informed decisions as to whether, and to what extent, corporate compliance programs were effective at the time of the offense. In some ways, the update brings the 2019 version of the document more fully in line with other available guidance and DOJ pronouncements, including most notably the 2012 DOJ/SEC FCPA Resource Guide.