FCPA Digest - July 2016

Recent Trends and Patterns in the Enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act

We are now halfway into 2016. After a few relatively slow years, it appears that 2016 may reflect a return to more active FCPA enforcement as, in the last six months, the two U.S. enforcement agencies, the DOJ and the SEC, have collectively brought as many cases as they did in the entire year of 2015 and more than in the two preceding years. What is interesting, however, is that, although some of the cases involved household corporate names, the penalties were relatively low—with the exception of the VimpelCom case— and the patterns of corruption, albeit with some exceptions, fairly mundane. More controversial have been some of the policy changes announced by the DOJ, placing a premium on voluntary disclosure and cooperation, including overtly and mandatorily "throwing employees under the bus" in exchange for allegedly deeper discounts on penalties and other forms of leniency. Finally,