A former Merck and Co Inc financial analyst was sentenced to three years and a month in prison for insider trading charge by the US Attorney of New York.
Legal & Regulatory
UK firms put to shame for escaping minimum wage laws
The British government has publicly announced a list of 115 business firms that are not adhering the minimum wages act. As per the National Minimum Wages (NMW) norms, these companies together owe about £389,000 ($598,500), according to the UK government. One fashion company, the Monsoon Accessorize topped the list among offenders. The UK government has decided to take action against them and may order them to reimburse their employees. It could also attract imposition of a fine for the offenders. The UK government will introduce a new National Living Wage in April 2016.
BLU Studio Energy 2, Energy X unveiled; 2 new big battery smartphones offer 30-day standby and 3-day standard usage
BLU has unveiled 2 New Big Battery Energy Series Smartphones named as the Studio Energy 2 and the Energy X. Both devices can offer up to 30 days of standby, or up to 3 days of “standard usage” per charge.
Starbucks and Fiat are required to pay back millions in taxes to Dutch and Luxembourg Government
The European Union Commission agreed that Starbucks Corp and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV is currently benefiting from illegal tax deals with the government. The decision came yesterday after the hearing organized by the European Parliament.
Sony agreed to pay $8M settlement to its employees
Sony Pictures Entertainment has agreed for an $8 million settlement with the company's former and current employee after its data was stolen in a cyber attack launched by North Korea. During the breach, information of its employees was stolen resulting in a mounting of lawsuits from each employee involved.
Latest News
The San Francisco Police Department and the Federal Aviation Administration will be working hand in hand to ban drones while imposing a $10,000 fine for offenders during the 2015 Fleet Week which is set to happen this weekend.
The US companies are keeping their profits made overseas out of the homeland in order to avoid taxes. It's estimated that 500 large US companies are holding over $2.1 trillion accumulated profits overseas to avoid taxes. These companies have to shell out $620billion by paying US taxes to repatriate the funds.
As the world is heading towards global economic uncertainty, regulators have agreed on a new term to make sure the industry will continue to stay strong. Companies are required to hold more capital under this new terms to avoid taxpayer from bailing out in case of any crisis in the future.
Ruling out North America's claim that European antitrust authority is going in an anti-US bias in dealing with Google and Apple, the European Competition Commissioner (ECC) Margrethe Vestager has termed it as a misleading notion of the world's largest economy. Vestager has been criticized in the US media for her role in opening multiple cases against the US corporate giants Google, Apple, Amazon and Starbucks during the past one year. Vestager has become the target of the US media as European regulators are protecting EU companies from the US competition.
The United States court finally comes out with the verdict regarding Exxon Mobil Corp oil spill in 2013. The fine was issued by the U.S. pipeline safety office ordering the oil giant to pay a total of $2.63 million for spilling the crude oil in Arkansas residential Area.
The United States imposes sanctions upon 30 individuals and groups linked to the Islamic State. Fifteen people were designated by the Treasury Department as Islamic State supporters, while 10 individuals and five groups were tagged by the State Department as foreign terrorist fighters.
The China's Commerce Ministry has slapped a fine on a joint venture (JV) between Microsoft Corporation and its Chinese partner BesTV in Xbox game console venture for breaking antitrust laws. However, the Redmond-based global IT major has escaped from a major penalty as the investigation didn't find any major fault on the part of Microsoft over market competition rules. The investigation on Xbox marketing drive revealed that Microsoft didn't obstruct the free market competition. The Chinese Commerce Ministry has imposed a penalty of Yuan 200,000 ($31,430) on Microsoft JV firm in China.
The trust that manages the $41 Billion Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation filed a lawsuit last Thursday that alleged the widespread corruption at the oil company and which was largely ignored by the auditor. This resulted to the charitable organization's loss of tens of millions of dollars.
Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), the Indian stock markets regulator, has imposed a heavy fine of $1.1 billion (INR 72.7bn) on New Delhi-based real estate firm PACL Ltd for illegally raising funds to the tune of INR491 bn from the market. Sebi has further directed PACL Ltd to cough up the fine amount within 45 days from the order date. The fine amount is the biggest penalty so far that SEBI imposed on any company.
