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Corporate prosecutions: individual liability is essential

Last week, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) unveiled new guidance to federal prosecutors about bringing criminal cases against individuals in instances of corporate wrongdoing.  The memo states that if a corporation wishes to resolve its own criminal charges and receive any credit for cooperation, it must provide the DOJ with all relevant facts relating […]

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Image credit: KeithAllisonPhoto.com, CC BY-SA 2.0 via Flickr

Incentivizing integrity in banks is more than just paying some fines

Three German banks Commerzbank, HypoVereinsbank and the state-owned HSH-Bank have just settled with tax authorities in Nordrhein-Westfalen on illegal aid to tax evasion. The banks assisted clients in shifting their funds from Luxembourg to Panama to put the money out of reach of German tax authorities. While the settlements partially provide for 8-digit fines, they […]

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How to win back trust in banks

The culture of profit before service at banks has led to a spate of serious scandals that have destroyed the public’s trust in the banking system. In March Transparency International wrote to the G30, a group of senior representatives of the private and public sectors and academia, which was tasked to develop recommendations on what […]

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Know your contractors: transparent ownership reduces corruption

Procurement is at the heart of the work that the World Bank and other international development banks do. Countries borrow from these multilateral organisations to develop the public works and services their citizens need: such as healthcare, education, sanitation and infrastructure. Through public procurement, countries use the borrowed funds to acquire expertise, labour and supplies […]

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Deutsche Bank settlement: does the punishment fit the crime?

Germany’s biggest bank, Deutsche Bank has agreed to pay a record US$2.5 billion in fines to US and UK authorities after one of its subsidiaries pleaded guilty to wire fraud for its role in manipulating LIBOR. This is more than your everyday bank scandal: LIBOR has an impact on millions of people, if not billions […]

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Secrecy breeds corruption

  This week the New York Times is running a series of hard-hitting investigative reports into who is buying luxury apartments in a single skyscraper overlooking Central Park in New York City, called Time Warner Center, and how they are doing it. It has highlighted a dubious bunch of big spenders allegedly enjoying the proceeds […]

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Illicit Financial Flows from Africa: a complex political problem

Last month African heads of state meeting in Addis Ababa received and endorsed the report of the High Level Panel on Illicit Financial Flows from Africa, which outlined where corrupt money comes from, where it goes and what needs to be done to stop it so that citizens can enjoy the wealth their countries produce. […]

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Redefining success: incentives for cultural change in banks

Despite the bailouts and regulation after the 2008 financial crisis, unethical behaviour at banks has cost shareholders close to US$10 billion over the past two years in the form of fines. No wonder there is fierce competition on both sides of the Atlantic, particularly now as banks are beginning to report their results, over diminishing […]

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