Compliance & Ethics

Reuters first reported on Sunday night that France’s Prudential Supervision and Resolution Authority (ACPR) had sanctioned Societe Generale with a reprimand and a €20 million fine tied to failures in its role as an insurance intermediary. According to the regulator, the bank failed to comply with pre-contractual information obligations and its duty to advise customers when selling both bundled and standalone insurance products.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s campaign against state crackdowns on prediction markets reached Minnesota on Tuesday, as the agency filed suit to block a new law that would make operating or assisting in the operation of a prediction market a criminal felony.

The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control announced this week that Adani Enterprises Limited agreed to pay $275 million to settle allegations tied to 32 apparent violations of U.S. sanctions on Iran after importing liquified petroleum gas that American authorities say actually originated there.

The Federal Court of Australia has ordered the operator of online retailer Snaffle to pay $21.7 million (AUD 33.5 million) in penalties after finding the company unlawfully overcharged tens of thousands of consumers through its credit contracts.

The Federal Trade Commission has officially begun enforcing the Take It Down Act, setting a start of a new federal requirement forcing online platforms to remove nonconsensual intimate images within 48 hours of receiving a valid request from victims.

Poland’s Office of Competition and Consumer Protection, known as UOKiK, said Thursday it had imposed a nearly $2.17 million (PLN 8.45 million) fine against Beliani after the company allegedly failed to cooperate with an ongoing investigation into its online sales practices.

The Australian Federal Court case against Coles Supermarkets Australia was, on paper, about supermarket shelf pricing. In practice, it became something larger and more uncomfortable for corporate compliance teams. Because once a company trains consumers to trust a label, a slogan, or a pricing program, the legal question is no longer just what the numbers technically say. It becomes whether the overall impression being created can survive scrutiny.