The science of compliance: The Tipline for 12 July 2019

Compliance might just be the most boring three syllables in antitrust reporting. Have you ever heard the story about the enormous cartel that was prevented by a robust compliance programme? No, because it was never broken up by the Department of Justice’s antitrust division and thus never reported on by GCR. Assistant attorney general Makan Delrahim yesterday announced the agency will now consider crediting a company’s existing compliance programmes during criminal sentencing in an effort to encourage more compliance investment. Delrahim said the change would ideally prevent antitrust violations from occurring, but he did not point out that this could potentially cut out quality GCR content.