The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act has always been a law much broader than its name suggests. Sure, the FCPA contains anti-bribery provisions which concern foreign bribery. Sure, the FCPA’s books and records and internal controls provisions can be implicated in foreign bribery schemes.
However, the fact remains that most FCPA enforcement actions (that is enforcement actions that charge or find violations of the FCPA’s books and records and internal controls provisions) have nothing to do with foreign bribery and these provisions are among the most generic legal provisions one can possibly find.
The latest example is this recent SEC enforcement action against Baxter International (and two former executives) “for engaging in improper intra-company foreign exchange transactions that resulted in the misstatement of the company’s net income.”