The Japan Fair Trade Commission's Report On Corporate Compliance Programs

The Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) recently published a report titled "Survey on Corporate Compliance Efforts with the Antimonopoly Act (Summary)". The report comes at a time that Japanese corporations are facing greater scrutiny at home and abroad for anticompetitive conduct. In 2012 thus far, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has already secured over $800 million in fines against Japanese defendants. This record number continues the upward trend in U.S. enforcement against Japanese companies over the past decade. At the same time, Japanese authorities have been increasing their competition enforcement activity, with the JFTC having issued over $400 million in surcharge payment orders to 290 enterprises for "unreasonable restraints of trade" in 2011.