The U.S. intervenes, I disagree, I agree, and say what. It’s all here in the Friday roundup.
U.S. Intervenes in Wynn-Okada Dispute
Numerous prior posts (see here, here and here for instance) have highlighted the dispute between Wynn Resorts and its former board member Kazuo Okada. Earlier this week, Bloomberg reported as follows. “The U.S. asked to intervene in a lawsuit brought by Wynn Resorts Ltd., which accused Okada of making improper payments to Philippine gambling regulators. The Justice Department said in an April 8 filing in state court in Las Vegas that it doesn’t want the civil case to disrupt its criminal investigation into the same underlying allegations.” According to Bloomberg: “Okada’s lawyers have said they would probably oppose the request “in whole or in part,” according to the filing. Wynn Resorts won’t oppose its request, the Justice Department said.” For additional coverage, see here from the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
I Disagree
Earlier this week a reader of the FCPA Blog (see here) posed the following question. “One thing that has not gotten much discussion is the possibility that the apparent slowdown in FCPA enforcement may be due to the spike in declinations.”
Putting aside the big-picture and highly relevant issue of what is a declination (see here as well as other embedded posts on this issue), when addressing the issue of FCPA enforcement statistics, it is important to keep in mind (as highlighted in this prior post) the following.
Just three unique historical events (Iraq Oil for Food, Bonny Island, Nigeria conduct, and Panalpina-related issues) served as the foundation for 35% of all corporate FCPA enforcement actions between 2007-2011 and resulted in 55% of settlement amounts in corporate enforcement actions between 2007-2011. Adding just the 2008 Siemens enforcement action to the settlement amount calculation, results in just four unique historical events accounting for 77% of settlement amounts in corporate enforcement actions between 2007-2011.
Recognizing these events and how they impacted FCPA enforcement data is important to understanding why FCPA enforcement has declined in recent years.
Even though FCPA enforcement has declined in recent years, unique events giving rise to FCPA enforcement actions have remained relatively constant between 2007 and 2012. In 2007, corporate FCPA enforcement actions were the result of 15 unique events. In 2008, corporate FCPA enforcement actions were the result of 10 unique events. In 2009, corporate FCPA enforcement actions were the result of 11 unique events. In 2010, corporate FCPA enforcement actions were the result of 14 unique events. In 2011, corporate FCPA enforcement actions were the result of 16 unique events. In 2012, corporate FCPA enforcement actions were the result of 12 unique events.
I Agree
Dieter Juedes (who like me is a product of Sheboygan County, Wisconsin) recently published “Taming the FCPA Overreach Through an Adequate Procedures Defense” in the William & Mary Business Law Review. Among other things, the article “proposes specific statutory language that Congress could use in adopting such a defense and it establishes precise factors to be promulgated by the DOJ and SEC for determining whether a firm’s procedure would be deemed “adequate.”
Given my prior article “Revisiting a Foreign Corrupt Practices Act Compliance Defense,” I agree with the general thrust of Juedes’s article.
Say What?
I don’t quite understand the logic or rationale of this op-ed piece in the South China Morning Post by Robert Precht (director of Justice Labs Limited, a Hong Kong think tank).
Precht argues that “the efforts of some Western countries to enforce their own anti-bribery laws in China are more likely to produce false accusations and hinder democratic reform than reduce corruption.” He states as follows. “One of the unintended harms of enforcing the US anti-bribery law in China is that it may actually stifle efforts to end corruption. US journalists, human rights workers and university researchers play an important role in shining light on the darker recesses of Chinese politics. Preventing Americans from making gifts to Chinese to obtain information useful to promote democratic reform will hinder the disclosure role the Americans play.”
According to Precht, “the solution is simple.” He argues that “the US Congress should amend the law, providing that it will only be applied in countries that meet certain minimum requirements of democracy and will not be applied in authoritarian regimes such as China.”
