Compliance & Ethics

The Bundeskartellamt has imposed fines totaling approximately €60.3 million on companies it says spent nearly a decade deciding among themselves who would win contracts before public authorities had finished inviting bids. The authority concluded that the firms divided customers, coordinated prices, and exchanged cover bids in the market for Dünne Asphaltdeckschichten in Kaltbauweise, or DSK, a cold-applied asphalt surfacing technique widely used to extend the life of roads.

When Rome awarded contracts to Bird, Dott, and Lime to operate shared e-bikes and e-scooters across the city, the companies promised something beyond simply making vehicles available. Holders of the annual Metrebus public transport pass would also receive packages of free rides, extending the reach of the city's transit network beyond the bus stop or train station. It was one of the commitments that helped secure the concession.

The Malta Financial Services Authority has published a new strategy for financial crime compliance, and what stands out is not what it asks firms to do differently today. It is how the regulator intends to supervise them tomorrow.

The Justice Department says Complete Health Partners Holdings crossed the line between documenting illness and manufacturing reimbursement. The Jacksonville, Florida-based management services organization has agreed to pay $14.1 million to resolve allegations that it caused false diagnosis codes to be submitted to inflate Medicare Advantage payments between 2020 and 2023. The settlement resolves claims brought under the False Claims Act and does not include an admission of liability.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has secured a default judgment against Adamant Stone Limited after alleging the purported investment adviser built its regulatory profile on claims it could not support.

For two years, according to federal prosecutors, the business model at Access DX Laboratory rested on finding more patients, ordering more genetic tests, and billing the government. The methods, the Justice Department alleges, included paying marketers for referrals, compensating telemedicine providers for fraudulent physician orders, breaking genetic tests into separately billable components, and sending Medicare and Medicaid the bill for testing that was not medically necessary. That alleged scheme has now produced a $36.4 million resolution.

Eight years after promising regulators it would fix persistent weaknesses in its anti-money laundering controls, UBS is paying for what those regulators say it failed to finish. Four regulators announced coordinated enforcement actions Monday imposing a combined $173 million in penalties against the firm, concluding that deficiencies identified years earlier continued to undermine transaction monitoring, customer due diligence, and suspicious activity reporting. The actions were brought by the Treasury Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.