News and commentary about white-collar crime, enforcement, and compliance
Harry Cassin
Publisher and Editor
Andy Spalding
Senior Editor
Jessica Tillipman
Senior Editor
Bill Steinman
Senior Editor
Richard L. Cassin
Editor at Large
Elizabeth K. Spahn
Editor Emeritus
Cody Worthington
Contributing Editor
Julie DiMauro
Contributing Editor
Thomas Fox
Contributing Editor
Marc Alain Bohn
Contributing Editor
Bill Waite
Contributing Editor
Russell A. Stamets
Contributing Editor
Richard Bistrong
Contributing Editor
Eric Carlson
Contributing Editor
Let’s start with recent events that might have escaped notice because of Covid-19 distractions. Two years ago, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, leaders representing about a thousand global companies kicked shareholder capitalism aside and replaced it with stakeholder capitalism.… Continue Reading
If you Google “corruption,” you get 344 million hits. A large number, yes, but dwarfed by “change management” with 4.1 billion hits. This is even more than “leadership,” usually the perennial front-runner in such corporate search exercises, with 3.53 billion hits.… Continue Reading
The world has now lived with the FCPA for more than 40 years and with hyper-enforcement for more than a decade. By now you’d think everyone on earth has learned about the risks of non-compliance.… Continue Reading
When 2017 began, I did not envisage how my life would change. I live and work in the British Virgin islands (BVI), a location rapidly becoming famous due to the publication of the Panama Papers and more latterly the Paradise Papers.… Continue Reading
The Milan Public Prosecutor’s Office has charged Royal Dutch Shell and four former executives for an alleged plot to pay massive bribes to win oil exploration rights in Nigeria.
One of those charged is Malcolm Brinded, 64, the former executive director for Upstream International when the alleged bribery happened.… Continue Reading
Tom Fox recently wrote a post for the FCPA Blog about allegations that Shell made a £1.1 billion ($1.42 billion) payment for an oil field license in Nigeria, with half the money ending up in a company owned by a Nigerian government official.… Continue Reading
What will be the final result of the Royal Dutch Shell/ENI imbroglio around a license to explore oil and gas in block OPL 246, offshore Nigeria?
At this point it is difficult to say.… Continue Reading
An oil and gas or mining company can avoid all kinds of reputational and legal challenges by swearing off deals with certain corruption warning signs. This month’s developments in an evolving scandal might have Royal Dutch Shell wishing it had done so.… Continue Reading
First the good news. The Netherlands ranked fifth on the latest Corruption Perceptions Index, up from eighth last year, and now trailing only Denmark, Finland, Sweden, and New Zealand on the CPI.… Continue Reading
The Texas Supreme Court issued a long-anticipated opinion Friday in Shell Oil Co. v. Writt, holding that an internal investigation report Shell provided to the U.S. Department of Justice about potential FCPA violations is “absolutely privileged” in a defamation proceeding and cannot be used to form the basis of a defamation claim.… Continue Reading
Italian prosecutors investigating state-owned oil giant Eni SpA over a Nigeria oilfield deal three years ago believe half of the $1.1 billion that Eni paid went as bribes to government officials or to intermediaries with close ties to them.… Continue Reading
The CEO of Italy’s biggest oil company, Claudio Descalzi, is under investigation by Milan prosecutors for alleged corruption tied to the company’s 2011 acquisition of a Nigerian deepwater offshore block for $1.09 billion.… Continue Reading