Herbalife reserves $123 million to settle China FCPA investigation
May 8, 2020
LA-based Herbalife Ltd.
has reserved $123 million to settle FCPA offenses,
following the indictment last year of two company executives charged
with spending $25 million on entertainment and gifts for Chinese officials.
In a 10-Q filing with the SEC
Thursday first posted by FCPA Tracker,
Herbalife said
it had reached an “understanding in principle” for the material terms of a settlement with both the SEC and DOJ.
With the SEC, Herbalife
said it would enter into an administrative resolution involving alleged violations of the books and records and internal controls provisions of the FCPA.
The company
would separately enter into a three-year deferred prosecution agreement with DOJ,
for a conspiracy to violate the FCPA’s books and records provisions.
Herbalife
— which sells dietary supplements through multi-level marketing —
said aggregate penalties, disgorgement, and prejudgment interest would be around $123 million.
In November 2019,
the DOJ charged two former Herbalife executives with bribing Chinese officials for ten years and covering it up by lying to the SEC and destroying evidence.
Jerry Li, 51, a Chinese citizen,
was the former head and managing director of Herbalife’s China subsidiary.
The DOJ
charged him with one count of conspiracy to violate the FCPA’s internal controls provisions, one count of perjury, and one count of destruction of records in federal investigations.
Mary Yang, 51, also Chinese,
formerly ran the external affairs department of Herbalife’s China subsidiary.
She was charged with one count of conspiracy to violate the FCPA’s internal controls provisions.
A criminal indictment
filed in New York City alleged that Yang and others bribed Chinese officials to obtain licenses for Herbalife.
Bribes were also intended
to stop Chinese government investigations into Herbalife’s operations in China and suppress negative coverage of the company by Chinese state-owned media outlets.
The company first disclosed the FCPA investigation in January 2017, according to data from FCPA Tracker.
The FCPA Blog
https://fcpablog.com/2020/05/08/herbalife-reserves-123-million-to-settle-china-fcpa-investigation/