Banks, Multinationals Paid $700bn Fines For Regulatory Infractions

The world’s largest corporations have paid $700bn in monetary penalties linked to regulatory infringements in 45 countries since 2010.

Major banks, especially those based in the USA and Europe, account for more than one-third of the penalties. Ninety-five parent companies have received $1bn or more in penalties.

These insights come from Violation Tracker Global, a new database created by the U.S. non-governmental organization Good Jobs First. The platform, which builds on previous databases focused on the U.S. and U.K., provides free access to information on corporate misconduct and regulatory infringements worldwide.

“Violation Tracker Global documents a broad spectrum of misconduct by multinational corporations in their global operations,” said Director of the Violation Tracker project, Philip Mattera.

“We hope this tool will support corporate accountability initiatives in various countries, including the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive,” he added.

Violation Tracker Global documents over 50,000 regulatory penalties imposed on 1,600 multinational corporations and their subsidiaries by 700 regulatory agencies and courts in the world’s largest economies in both the Global North and the Global South

The cases in Violation Tracker Global are divided into eight broad offense groups: Competition/Antitrust, Consumer Protection, Employment, Environment, Financial, Government Contracting, Healthcare, and Safety.

Each entry is also tagged with one of about 100 more specific offense categories, such as privacy/data protection violations, bribery, money laundering, and workplace safety. Some countries do not disclose data in all these categories.

Entries include additional details, such as a description of the offense, the monetary penalty (both in the original currency and the equivalent in U.S. dollars), and a link back to the information source, which in most cases is the website of the regulatory agency.

The report lists all the countries and jurisdictions covered by Violation Tracker Global, including: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Czech Republic, Denmark, the European Commission, the European Free Trade Association, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kenya, Malaysia, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the USA, and Vietnam.

Additionally, bribery cases from the African Development Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, and the World Bank are also included.