All Compliance Week articles in Web Issue – Page 600
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BlogSciClone to Pay SEC $12.8 Million in FCPA Case
SciClone Pharmaceuticals announced that it has entered into a $12.8 million settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission to resolve an investigation of potential violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act with respect to its China operations. SciClone further said that the Department of Justice has also completed its related ...
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BlackRock CEO Urges Rethinking of Quarterly Earnings
Image: In recent months an increasing number of investor advocates have expressed concerns that companies worry more about short-term quarterly earnings and estimates, not enough about long-term, sustainable growth. In a Feb. 1 letter to nearly 500 companies, Laurence Fink, co-founder and CEO of BlackRock offered his take, urging “resistance ...
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Barclays, Credit Suisse to Pay $150 Million for Dark Pool Violations
The Securities and Exchange Commission last month announced that Barclays Capital and Credit Suisse Securities have agreed to settle separate cases for violating federal securities laws while operating alternative trading systems known as dark pools and Credit Suisse’s Light Pool. Both firms collectively will pay more than $150 million to ...
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Wells Fargo to Pay $1.2 Billion for ‘Reckless’ Lending Practices
Wells Fargo & Company said this week in a securities filing that it would pay $1.2 billion to resolve certain civil claims relating to the company’s Federal Housing Administration lending activities. In a Form 8-K filing, Wells Fargo said it had reached an agreement in principle with the Justice Department, ...
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BlogFASB Proposes Eight New Cash Flow Classification Rules
Current accounting rules are either unclear or silent on how to classify cash flows in certain instances, so FASB is proposing an update to the Accounting Standards Codification to fill the gaps. The board is looking to clarify several issues with such transactions as debt prepayments, settlement of zero-coupon bonds, ...
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IIA Seeks to Raise Bar on Internal Audit Practices
The Institute of Internal Auditors is proposing a change to its professional practice standards to give internal auditors some new guidance in light of evolving business demands. The IIA says the proposed changes are focused on enhancing existing standards on communications and quality assurance, and creating new standards addressing objectivity ...
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Mitigating export control violations
Image: The U.S. Department of Commerce Bureau of Industry and Security is considering proposed rules that, on the one hand, would significantly raise the stakes for companies that run afoul of export control regulations but, on the other hand, bring greater transparency to the enforcement process. “The guidelines generally provide ...
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New Customs Database Triggers Regulatory Concerns
Image: By the end of 2016, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection will require that all cargo shipment details be reported through ACE (Automated Commercial Environment), a new electronic processing system. Use of this system, aimed at automating and consolidating border processing, brings with a number of challenges for both ...
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ArticleAssessing risks country-by-country
A new Transparency International report examining public sector corruption reveals both good news and bad news: More countries saw their anti-corruption scores improve, rather than decline—but corruption, overall, is still rife globally. Compliance and risk officers can use the benchmark to help reassess where to focus their due diligence and ...
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EU, U.S. Agree on New Safe Harbor Framework
The European Union and the United States have agreed on a new framework that will allow for trans-Atlantic data flows between Europe and the United States. The new arrangement will provide stronger obligations on U.S. companies to protect the personal data of Europeans and stronger monitoring and enforcement by the ...
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Debate continues over the practice of quarterly reporting
Amid discussion about reforms to the SEC’s disclosure regime, perhaps no idea is as controversial as the rethinking of how frequently companies must disclose financial information. While it may seem a cornerstone of public filings, quarterly 10-Q financial statements have only been an SEC requirement since 1970. There’s now a ...
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Revenue recognition: full retrospective, modified retrospective, or somewhere in-between
Companies looking to implement the new revenue standard are faced with the difficult choice of going full retrospective, modified retrospective, or somewhere in-between. Those at the forefront of implementing the standard are starting to favor the idea of presenting three complete years of historical data under the new rules, but ...
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OCC will add "recovery plans" alongside big bank stress tests
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency is seeking comment on “enforceable guidance” that will require banks with assets of $50 billion or more to create “recovery plans.” While resolution plans, orchestrated by the Federal Reserve and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, largely focus on liquidity and asset quality, the ...
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SEC Charges SAP With FCPA Violations
Germany-based software manufacturer SAP has agreed to give up $3.7 million in sales profits in a settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission to resolve charges that it violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act when procuring business in Panama.
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The Swiss Tackle International Corruption
Last week the Swiss government announced that it had found improprieties in the conduct of the Malaysian government’s sovereign wealth fund, 1Malyasia Development Berhad. The problem for the government of Malaysia is that the sovereign wealth fund is headed by the country’s Prime Minister, who had over $700 million deposited ...
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Public Procurement Simplified Across the EU
A new system adopted by the European Commission that went into force last week considerably reduces the administrative burden for companies that want to have a fair shake at winning a public contract. According to the European Commission, simplification of the tender procedure is just one of the major elements ...
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Treasury Moves to Shine a Light on Real Estate Transactions
Recently, the U.S. Treasury Department said it would begin demanding to know the names of folks behind the shell companies, which ultra-wealthy foreigners use to hide behind multimillion-dollar real estate purchases. Efforts by the U.S. Treasury Department to police more closely large cash purchases of real estate as a method ...
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SEC Nudges Companies on XBRL Calculation Relationships
The SEC has updated its ongoing “Frequently Asked Questions” document on interactive data disclosures to address when calculation relationships, which provide key information to show relationships among elements and their corresponding numeric facts, are required in XBRL filings. The FAQs come in response to the SEC’s issuance of a “Dear ...
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Ensco Names General Counsel and Secretary
U.K.-based Ensco, a global provider of offshore drilling services to the petroleum industry, has named Michael McGuinty as general counsel and secretary, effective Feb. 1. He will be based in London. McGuinty succeeds Ron Potter, associate general counsel, who has been serving as interim general counsel.