British companies hoping for a compliance reprieve from the U.K.'s key law against bribery could have a long wait ahead of them, with no promise of getting what they've asked for, say attorneys.
U.K. leaders intend to review whether facilitation should be legal again, CFATF warns countries about the risks of Belize, Guyana and Dominica, and more, in this week's news roundup.
Though none can predict the future, one thing in the AML world seems certain: the jobs of compliance officers won't get any easier in 2013.
As prosecutors continue to accuse companies and individuals of foreign bribery, banks should be cautious about how they acquire licenses and sovereign wealth accounts, and where their clients send money abroad, say consultants.
The U.S. Justice Department's long-awaited guidance for businesses complying with a foreign anti-bribery law will do little to change its enforcement even as it sets some minds at ease, say attorneys.
As global efforts to crack down on bribery grow, financial institutions need to more closely scrutinize the accounts they maintain for politically-tied figures, according to a former senior assistant U.S. attorney.
Since its inception, some of the country's top corporations have asked lawmakers to scale back the reach of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which prohibits bribing foreign officials in conjunction with business deals, with one notable absence: the banking lobby.
A Russian law that prohibits corporate bribes and raises the ceiling on punitive fines isn't likely to impede businesses from offering illegal incentives to win lucrative contracts, say political observers.
Senate panel members Tuesday criticized the U.S. Justice Department's enforcement of a U.S. anti-bribery law even as representatives from the commercial sector asked Congress to better shield it from penalties.
The departure Friday of the Justice Department's top enforcer of the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act will mark an end to an era, not a slowdown in penalties against violators, say analysts.
The rise in U.S. prosecutions of companies that bribe foreign officials won't likely plateau for another four or five years, when European countries are expected to further clamp down on the crime, according to the former assistant chief for the Fraud Section of the Justice Department.
A British anti-bribery bill expected to pass this month could increase the likelihood that U.S. financial institutions and other companies will face sizable monetary penalties for overseas deals, say consultants.
The U.S. Justice Department plans to grow its staff of less than 10 prosecutors specializing in cases tied to the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act to 15 or more, a spokeswoman confirmed.
The U.S. Justice Department nets 22 suspects in its largest ever investigation into individuals for FCPA violations, and FinCEN issues a ruling on whether domestic bill payment services companies are MSBs, in this week's roundup.
Banks and other companies around the world are delaying deals in developing markets, in some cases canceling projects altogether, because they are afraid of being snared by anti-corruption laws, according to a private survey released today.
The conviction of a former U.S. congressman on corruption charges is more than just another public scandal, say white-collar crime analysts. It's a sign that the United States is increasingly willing to levy a 1977 anti-bribery law against individuals, they say.
The number and size of fines levied annually against financial institutions and other corporations for bribery is likely to continue to rise as the global recession fuels corruption, say analysts.
Financial institutions are increasingly renegotiating or dropping planned business deals over concerns that they might violate U.S. anti-bribery laws, according to a survey released Monday.
Financial institutions would be wise to make use of a recently published list of individuals and companies restricted from doing business with the World Bank, say compliance professionals.
The U.S. Justice Department entered into 60 percent fewer pre-trial agreements with corporations seeking to avoid criminal prosecutions in 2008 than in the previous year, according to a study released Friday.