Abigail Bellows with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace describes how a $5 million surcharge could be levied on FCPA enforcement actions and then deployed quickly to support incipient anti-corruption efforts worldwide. This would address, in part, concerns that the victims of corruption rarely benefit from the substantial sums involved in settlements.

Omar Zúñiga of Mexico City&rsquos Creel law firm discusses the tax provisions there that are making companies nervous and prompting a scramble to vet vendors against blacklists.

Mike Ward, partner at Vinson & Elkins in San Francisco and former chief compliance officer with Juniper Networks, discusses the overstated role attributed to business partners as the sole conduit of corruption. Mike also addresses the widely misunderstood role that agents, distributors and channel partners play, and why companies often need to work through these sales and marketing networks to go to market worldwide.

Barnard College professor Alex Cooley and Wiley partner Kevin Muhlendorf discuss telecommunications scandals and the risk of corruption in 5G telecom implementation. They are the authors of chapters on these two subjects in TRACE&rsquos new book, Corrosive: Corruption and its Consequences.

Kara Brockmeyer, a partner in Debevoise & Plimpton&rsquos Washington, D.C. office and former Chief of the SEC&rsquos FCPA Unit, discusses some changes she&rsquos observed in the implementation of compliance programs with much of the world in lockdown. She also describes the pace of investigations now that DOJ and SEC lawyers are working remotely, and she wraps up with a few predictions about what we might see in this field post-pandemic.