Over the past week, the Japanese company Hitachi was subject to a multi-million dollar fine for bribing South African officials to win over power plant contracts. By using another company to facilitate the transaction and to engage in South African officials, the Hitachi organization was found they were being non-compliant with the SEC and the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
The Responsible Sourcing Network recently published their Mining the Disclosures 2015, which took an in-depth look at conflict minerals SEC filings. The report assessed companies processes when tracing their supply chains back to where their minerals were sourced from in an effort to ensure they were conflict-free.
Whenever companies think about corruption or bribery, they tend to focus on 3rd party business partners such as sales agents and distributers. Although these are areas of very high risk, there are other avenues of concern that can and will expose a company to bribery and risk. Supply chains, as vast as they are, increase your vulnerability tremendously. Suppliers are considered 3rd party business partners and have a tier level that makes it even more difficult to control and over see.
Source Intelligence hosts session with Responsible Sourcing Network on day of report’s release
Press Release
Carlsbad, CA, August 31 , 2015 /3BL Media/ – The Sept. 22 release of an authoritative study on current conflict minerals filings will include a live webcast to provide investors, suppliers, stakeholders and U.S. companies with additional insights into the research as well as recommendations to enhance compliance.
Yesterday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit reaffirmed its April 2014 decision regarding the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Conflict Minerals Rule: the requirement to describe products as having “not been found to be DRC conflict Free” violates the First Amendment.
The United States Justice Department has continued its international investigation into Uzbek President Islam Karimovs eldest daughter, Gulnara Karimova. Gulnara, who is currently under house arrest in Uzbekistan, has been the target of investigations since September of 2014. Gulnara has allegedly accepted bribes from Russian and Swedish companies for access to Uzbekistan’s telecommunications market.
Data Scientist Eric Lessert weighs in on holistic data management
Blog
More and more global brands and their suppliers have been impacted by the requirements set forth in the Dodd Frank Section 1502, regarding conflict minerals. The regulation stipulates that publically traded companies must disclose their conflict minerals sourcing.
June 1, 2015 will be the second time publicly traded companies will be required to file their conflict minerals reports (CMRs) with the SEC. Enacted in 2010, Dodd-Frank 1502, a regulation with the goal to minimize minerals produced and refined under conflict, requires companies to disclose the origin of tin, tungsten, tantalum and gold (3TG) in their supply chains.
BOSTON, April 17, 2015 /3BL Media/ – Just one day after BP adopted a shareholder resolution to support better carbon asset risk disclosures following disappointing global oil demand and low oil prices, 62 institutional investors representing nearly $2 trillion in assets called on the Securities and Exchange Commission to push for better disclosure by oil and gas companies of critical climate change-related business risks that will “profoundly affect the economics of the industry.”