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Daily Compliance News

November 25, 2019, the Another FCPA Guilty Verdict edition

In today’s edition of Daily Compliance News:

  • Another guilty verdict in FCPA trial. (WSJ)
  • Samsung guility of FCPA violations, pays $75MM and gets DPA. (DOJ Press Release)
  • Tyler Swift calls out Carlyle Group over Scooter Braun imbroglio. (NYT)
  • Corruption protests in Colombia. (Independent)
Categories
Daily Compliance News

November 24, 2019 Sunday Book Review

In today’s edition Sunday Book Review edition of Daily Compliance News:

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Daily Compliance News

November 23, 2019, the Bribery is Just Tipping edition

In today’s edition of Daily Compliance News:

  • Maybe Hoskins should have used this defense “Bribing is just tipping”. (Law360)
  • Work for WeWork, T—S—, unless of course you are Adam Neumann. (NYT)
  • Mother was right, “Don’t Lie”. Former Och-Ziff exec sentenced to prison for lying to FBI. (WSJ)
  • Banks snubbed on Aramco IPO. (FT)
Categories
This Week in FCPA

Episode 181-the Fishy Letters edition

SEC Chair Jay Clayton is reduced to having a PR firm create fake investor comments to support a SEC rule change. The Astros cheating scandal gets worse. As Tom worries MLB might take away his replica World Series Championship Trophy and Jay consoles him about when a team cheats and wins, they turn to some other of this week’s top compliance and ethics stories which caught their collective eyes.

  1. Using the same defense as Hoskins, Boustani admits bribery and corruption in Mozambique Tuna Boat case. Will it work out any better for him? Steward Bishop and Frank Runyeon in Law360. (Sub Req’d)
  2. SEC whistleblower tips go down for the first time. Kristen Broughton in the WSJ Risk and Compliance Journal. Kevin LaCroix sees it otherwise, on the D&O Diary.
  3. Jay Clayton gins up fake written comments to support regulation change. Zachary Mider and Ben Elgin report in Bloomberg.
  4. Former Keppel Offshore lawyer sentenced to time served. Dick Cassin reports in the FCPA Blog.
  5. Why punishing the bribe takers is equally important as punishing the bribe payors? Matthew Stephenson explains it all in the Global Anti-Corruption Blog.  
  6. Does an aggressive position in a Wells submission hurt a company in a SEC enforcement action? Lawyers from Simpson Thatcher explore in NYU’s Compliance and Enforcement Blog.
  7. What is ‘enforcement fatigue’ and how did Alstom overcome it? Dylan Tokar reports in the WSJ Risk and Compliance Journal.
  8. of Treasury bringing more sanctions cases against shipping companies. Kristin Broughton reports in the WSJ Risk and Compliance Journal.
  9. What will risk and compliance look like in 2020? David Banks considers in Navex Global’s Ethics & Compliance Matters blog.
  10. How does M&A benefit from an independent assessment? Jay continues his series on CCI.
  11. What are the implications of Gen Z on the front lines of compliance? Gaurov Kapoor explores in CCI.
  12. Recent FCPA enforcement actions shows the SEC will use FCPA Accounting Provisions to hold a company liable for ineffective AML controls. Clay Porter in the National Law Review.
  13. Navex’s Loren Johnson joins the podcast to talk about Navex Global’s 2020 Benchmarking Survey.You can participate in Navex Global’s annual survey by clicking here.

Tom Fox is the Compliance Evangelist and can be reached at tfox@tfoxlaw.com. Jay Rosen is Mr. Monitor and can be reached at jrosen@affiliatedmonitors.com.
For more information on how an independent monitor can help improve your company’s ethics and compliance program, visit our sponsor Affiliated Monitors at www.affiliatedmonitors.com.

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Daily Compliance News

November 22, 2019, the Netanyahu Indicted edition

In today’s edition of Daily Compliance News:

  • Germany passes a raft of AML laws. (com)
  • Israelis PM indicted on corruption charges. (NYT)
  • FCPA leniency program gets tweaks. (WSJ)
  • Wells Fargo in hot water again. (Washington Post)
Categories
Creativity and Compliance

Improv(e) Your Culture

Where does creativity fit into compliance? In more places than you think. Problem-solving, accountability, communication, and connection – they all take creativity. Join Tom Fox and Ronnie Feldman on Creativity and Compliance, part of the Compliance Podcast Network. In this show, we discuss how improvisation can be supportive to ethics and compliance programs by helping internal and external communications and driving a culture of compliance throughout an organization.
Some of the highlights include:

  • Improv is not simply comedy. It’s a skill that improvisers use to make comedy on stage. This skill has application to the ethics and compliance professionals, from leadership teams and to all employees.
  • You can think of it as Applied Improvisation. Applied Improvisation is “yoga for your communication skills”.
  • While we cannot teach you to be funny, Improv techniques can teach you
  • How to be better listeners;
  • How to increase awareness;
  • How to make connections and build rapport and trust;
  • How to be more adaptable and agile; and
  • How to diffuse emotional situations.
  • Think of it as Applied Improvisation. Applied Improvisation is “yoga for your communication skills”
  • Improv techniques can help ethics, compliance and legal teams to be less scary and better listeners.
  • Improv techniques can be seen as leadership development skills as its reframing conversations and discussions with senior management to help create a system of trust and support.
  • Improv techniques can help build a better culture through encouraging respectful disagreement, being more open minded about challenging assumption, assuming positive intent, validating and building bridge to commonality and helping foster active listening.
  • The bottom line is the improv techniques can help give employees skills and tools that will help them challenge business decisions respectfully and to encourage them to stop disrespectful behavior when they encounter it.
  • Finally, take an improv class! You will love it!

Resources:
Ronnie Feldman (LinkedIn)
Learnings & Entertainments (LinkedIn)
Ronnie Feldman (Twitter)
Learnings & Entertainments (Website)
60-Second Communication & Awareness Shorts – A variety of short, customizable, quick-hitter “commercials” including songs & jingles, video shorts, newsletter graphics & Gifs, and more. Promote integrity, compliance, the Code, the helpline and the E&C team as helpful advisors and coaches.
Workplace Tonight Show! Micro-learning – a library of 1-10-minute trainings and communications wrapped in the style of a late-night variety show, that explains corporate risk topics and why employees should care.
Custom Live & Digital Programing – We’ll develop programming that fits your culture and balances the seriousness of the subject matter with a more engaging delivery.

Categories
Daily Compliance News

November 21, 2019, the 50MM Chickens edition

In today’s edition of Daily Compliance News:

  • Privinvest Group executive Jean Boustani readily admits to paying bribes in Mozambique. (Law360) sub req’d
  • Criminal books and records charges filed against former Braskem CEO. (DOJ Press Release)
  • Former BA exec charged with accepting $5MM in bribes from contractor for work. (New York Post)
  • Studio exec wanted Julia Roberts to play Harriet Tubman in movie. (MarketWatch)
Categories
Great Women in Compliance

Cindy Morrison-Part 1, Espousing the Four Agreements

Welcome to the Great Women in Compliance Podcast, co-hosted by Lisa Fine and Mary Shirley. In this Part 1 of a special two-part episode, Mary Shirley begins a conversation with Cindy Morrison. Cindy is the Director of Compliance at Post Holdings, Inc. Like many great Compliance relationships, Mary met Cindy Morrison through Compliance Connector Jay Rosen at a volunteering event in Las Vegas in the lead up to the 2015 SCCE CEI.
Mary identified Cindy as an exemplary candidate for the Great Women in Compliance Podcast because of her calm and unwavering presence in environments of chaos and noise – a key strength for any capable and grounded Compliance Officer.
In this episode, part one of a two-part series with Cindy, Cindy shares some of the risks specific to the food industry as she works as Director of Compliance at Post Holdings.
Cindy also shares her journey getting to her current position, having started out as a paralegal.
She goes on to discuss how her passion for Compliance goes beyond her 9-5 job as one of the organizers of a community of Compliance professionals in the St Louis area and gives tip on how to make such group get togethers work for listeners interested in establishing their own local networks of Compliance meetings with colleagues from neighboring companies.
If you enjoy this episode or the podcast generally, please rate this podcast in your favorite podcast player where you can find this discussion with Cindy and all of our other episodes.
Join the Great Women in Compliance community on LinkedIn here.

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Daily Compliance News

November 20, 2019, the Fishy Letters edition

In today’s edition of Daily Compliance News:

  • Top Vatican AML official leaves post. (YahooNews)
  • SEC Chair cites fishy letters as support for his policy change. (Bloomberg)
  • Federal workers who failed to check in on Epstein arrested. (NYT)
  • FedEx boss says NYT is wrong, his company paid lots of taxes (they just didn’t report them?). (Washington Post)
Categories
Why a Duck

Coconuts and SEC Year End FCPA Enforcement Actions

From Vaudeville to the Silver Screen to the Small Screen, the Marx Brothers made an impact wherever people found them. Now Tom Fox and Mike Volkov have wedded their love of the Marx Brothers with their passion for compliance and bring them into the boardroom to help explain and explore the sometimes-chaotic world of governance, risk-management, ethics and compliance. In this episode they discuss the movie Coconuts and how it informs the three SEC fiscal year end FCPA enforcement actions.  Highlights from the podcast include:

  1. What can we learn from Quad/Graphics and sham 3rd parties?
  2. Beware of over expansion without appropriate FCPA controls.
  3. Why does control override inform the enforcement action involving Westport Fuels Systems?
  4. The M&A implications of Westport Fuels Systems?
  5. Why does the Barclays FCPA enforcement action get back to FCPA basics?
  6. How effective is your training program?

Resources
From Tom Fox

  1. Westport Fuels
  2. Barclays
  3. Quad/Graphics

From Mike Volkov

  1. Barclays
  2. Quad Graphics

Marx Brothers
Coconuts-the full movie on YouTube.