How can you beat the stock market? Become a member of Congress and trade on legislative actions! You might think that a member of Congress would be prohibited from trading on non-public information that they obtain through their official position. You might be wrong. Members of Congress and their staff do not owe any “duty … Read more »
Category: Compliance Programs
Did Compliance Programs Fail During the Financial Industry Meltdown?
Most people would say yes to this question. I think the answer is more complex. A stand alone compliance program could not prevent the over-exuberance, excessive risk taking, and ethical lapses that lead to the meltdown. The inspiration for this post came from an article by David Hechler, Risky Business: Did compliance programs fail the … Read more »
Corporate Compliance & Ethics Week is May 3 to 9
The Society of Corporate Compliance & Ethics is promoting the week of May 3-9, 2009 as Corporate Compliance & Ethics Week. Read more »
Betting the Corporation: Compliance or Defiance
Lawrence D. Finder, Ryan D. McConnell & Scott L. Mitchell drafted a paper surveying the sixteen corporate deferred prosecutions and non-prosecution agreements entered into by the Department of Justice in 2008. Betting the Corporation: Compliance or Defiance? Compliance Programs in the Context of Deferred and Non-Prosecution Agreements – Corporate Pre-Trial Agreement Update – 2008 In … Read more »
Seven Questions to Ask to Optimize Your Compliance Programs
Compliance Week put on a webinar covering Practical Guidance: Seven Questions to Ask to Optimize Your Compliance Programs. Bruce McCuaig, Vice President, Risk and Compliance and Mike Rost, Vice President, Marketing of Paisley presented. Mike started off with some background of Paisley, then moved onto the “Why?” of Compliance. Companies want to avoid the downside … Read more »
Conducting C-Suite Investigations
EthicsPoint presented a webinar on conducting C-Suite Investigations, with Sally Rhys, BA, MS, CCEP of Business Ethics Focus. No-one wants to believe that allegations against the C-suite (Senior Executives) could be true. But with daily news reports of more cases of illegal and unethical transgressions by senior leaders, we all know that every organization is … Read more »
Cost-effective Compliance Risk Assessment
Rees Morrison, publisher of Law Department Management, is hosting a series of articles on Cost-effective Compliance Risk Assessment. This series is written by Jeff Kaplan of Kaplan & Walker LLP. The first article was on Three trends regarding the costs of ineffective compliance. Jeff first focused on the increasing occurrence of the “mega fine.” Then … Read more »
The Inside Story on the Breakdown at the SEC
Adam Zagorin and Michael Weisskopf wrote a very critical article in Time Magazine about Christopher Cox’s tenure with the Securities and Exchange Commission: The Inside Story on the Breakdown at the SEC. The authors use Cox as a symbol of what went wrong with the US financial system, resulting it its current meltdown. They paint … Read more »
Policies for Private Use of Company Computer Systems and Mobile Devices
Mark E. Schreiber and Barbara A. Lee published an article on the New Liabilities and Policies for Incidental Private Use of Company Electronic Systems and PDAs. The discussion in the article comes from the decision in Quon v. Arch Wireless Operating Company, Inc., 529 F.3d 892 (9th Cir. 2008). In that case the court found … Read more »
The 2008 LRN Ethics and Compliance Risk Management Practices Report
LRN published their 2008 LRN Ethics and Compliance Risk Management Practices Report (.pdf) (free registration required) The report is based on a survey of senior ethics, legal, risk and audit professionals, with 461 completed surveys. The key findings of the report: Ethics and compliance programs are maturing Companies identify their top two ethics and compliance … Read more »