Search results for: ofac
BAT’s Big Sanctions Settlement
Another week, another eye-popping enforcement action in sanctions compliance! This time around it’s British American Tobacco, paying $630 million to settle charges that the company engaged in a long-running scheme to evade U.S. sanctions and sell goods into North Korea. The Justice Department and the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) announced the settlement jointly…
Read MoreMicrosoft Fined $3.3M on Sanctions
Microsoft has agreed to pay more than $3.3 million to settle civil charges that its Russia subsidiary violated U.S. sanctions law in the 2010s by covering up sales of Microsoft products to people in Cuba, Iran, and elsewhere. The settlement was announced on Thursday by the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and the Bureau…
Read MoreThe Bittrex Sanctions Settlement
Before we all rush into the weekend, compliance officers should take a look at that enforcement action against cryptocurrency platform Bittrex that was announced earlier this week. It offers some valuable lessons about building a sanctions compliance program on the fly and what regulators expect crypto firms to do for sanctions risk. The enforcement action…
Read MoreMore Lessons on Sanctions Programs
Anyone looking for systemic failures in sanctions compliance and how a company might rectify those issues, look no further than Toll Holdings and the settlement it reached with U.S. regulators on Monday. Toll, a freight forwarding and logistics business based in Australia, agreed to pay $6.1 million to the Office of Foreign Assets Control to…
Read MoreFinCEN Offers Red Flags on Russia
Today we return to risks arising from the Ukraine crisis, because FinCEN has just published an alert warning financial firms to watch for transactions that might actually be Russians trying to avoid Western sanctions — including a list of red flags that AML compliance functions should keep on the radar screen. FinCEN published the 10-page…
Read MoreUkraine Compliance Risks: A List
In our previous post we paused to consider some of the larger, more existential challenges to corporate ethics programs raised by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Today I want to shift to some of the practical compliance challenges — because those challenges are many and diverse, and compliance professionals need to start putting them into a…
Read MoreThoughts on the Ukraine Crisis
Years ago — no, wait, it was last Wednesday — I planned to have a post today about the SEC enforcement action against Baxter International. We all know what happened next, and after that, what compliance professional can focus on internal controls right now? Since Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine last week, I’ve been trying to…
Read MoreAnother Interesting Sanctions Case
Another week, another interesting sanctions enforcement action from the Office of Foreign Assets Control. This time we have a Hong Kong trading company fined $5.2 million for facilitating trade with a chemicals business in Iran — but also catching a break because the company had warned its employees repeatedly to steer clear of Iranian customers.…
Read MoreAirBnB Rapped on Cuba Issues
AirBnB has started off 2022 with a telling little enforcement action, paying $91,200 to the Office of Foreign Assets Control for failing to monitor how people were using the lodging platform to book visits in Cuba. OFAC announced the settlement Monday. The fine is insignificant considering that AirBnB reported $2.2 billion in revenue for its…
Read MoreCompliance Jobs Report: Sept. 10
The Compliance Jobs Report this week has new hires at Credit Suisse, Marsh McLennan, Cox Communications, Bank of America, and a trendy fintech firm named Dapp, among others. We also have promotions at Walmart, CEVA Logistics, and elsewhere; plus job openings in entertainment, education, and pharmaceuticals. Our Meme of the Week goes out, sadly, to…
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