Relief to Gautam Adani in Indictment Case? US Scraps Foreign Corruption Act

Washington: After US President Donald Trump signed an executive order to halt the enforcement of a law Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) that prohibits US companies from bribing foreign officials, claiming that the restriction disadvantages American firms, all the listed stocks of the Adani Group witnessed substantial gains on Tuesday. The nearly half-century-old law was used to launch a bribery investigation against the Adani Group.

The US President directed Attorney General Pam Bondi to suspend actions under the Act, until she establishes new enforcement guidelines, as outlined in a fact sheet on the executive order. Additionally, all current and past actions under the FCPA will be reviewed.

“Since its enactment in 1977, the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (15 U.S.C. 78dd-1 et seq.) (FCPA) has been systematically, and to a steadily increasing degree, stretched beyond proper bounds and abused in a manner that harms the interests of the United States,” according to a White House statement.

Current FCPA enforcement impedes the United States’ foreign policy objectives and therefore implicates the President’s Article II authority over foreign affairs.

The FCPA forbids any company or individual with US ties from offering money or gifts to foreign officials to secure business overseas.