Welcome to Allen & Overy’s Investigations Insight blog, sharing with you our views and insights into the latest trends, risks and developments in business crime and financial services investigations
DPA penalty discount for self reporting: change recommended by House of Lords committee
02 April 2019 Eve Giles
The operation of the Bribery Act 2010 has been subjected to post-legislative scrutiny for the first time since it came into force. A House of Lords Committee heard evidence from businesses, NGOs, lawyers, judges, enforcement authorities and the government. The report, published on 14 March, is largely very positive about the impact of the Act. › Read More
Instant Messaging Apps and Corporate Record Retention Policies: revised DOJ guidance for companies
26 March 2019 Eugene Ingoglia
The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has issued revised guidance regarding what records companies must retain to be eligible for full remediation credit under the FCPA Corporate Enforcement Policy. Previously, the Policy effectively required companies to ban the use of any ephemeral messaging applications which automatically delete data, such as WhatsApp and Wickr. The amended › Read More
Pressure mounting for new failure to prevent economic crime corporate criminal offence
15 March 2019 Eve Giles
“Multi-national firms appear beyond the scope of legislation designed to counter economic crime.” This was the damning conclusion of a House of Commons Treasury Committee report on Economic Crime published last week. Those hoping that the UK government has forgotten about its manifesto commitment to reform corporate liability for economic crime will be disappointed. Recent › Read More
06 March 2019 Jason Denisenko
The final report (the Report) of the Australian Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry (the Royal Commission) was released on 4 February 2019. The Report provides 76 specific recommendations to the Government, the financial sector, and financial regulators to redress the misconduct revealed by the inquiry. These recommendations reflect › Read More
HMRC makes it easier to self-report (or whistle blow) on facilitation of tax evasion
28 February 2019 Hayley Humphries
There are only five on going investigations by HMRC under the ‘failure to prevent the facilitation of UK tax evasion’ corporate criminal offence introduced by the Criminal Finances Act 2017, according to a House of Commons question and answer earlier this month. There was no mention of any investigations relating to the equivalent facilitation of › Read More