In order to provide an overview for busy in-house counsel and compliance professionals, we summarize below some of the most important international anti-corruption developments in the past month, with links to primary resources. What happened with the UK Serious Fraud Office’s first deferred prosecution agreement? What was contained in the most recent annual SEC whistleblower report? Who is the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) new Compliance Counsel? What countries had important legislative developments? It’s all here and more in our November 2015 Top Ten list:

1. UK Serious Fraud Office (SFO) Brings First DPA. The month ended with perhaps the biggest news of all, when at a hearing on November 30, 2015, a UK court approved the SFO’s first-ever deferred prosecution agreement (DPA). At the hearing, Lord Justice Leveson approved the DPA proposed by the SFO with London-based ICBC Standard Bank Plc, for allegedly failing to prevent bribery contrary to section 7 of the Bribery Act 2010 (UKBA). In entering into the DPA, Standard Bank agreed to pay penalties totaling $32.2 million and to an independent review of its anti-bribery policies. DPAs have been available for use by the SFO since February 2014, following their introduction in the Crime and Courts Act 2013, and the SFO signaled its intention to begin using DPAs by inviting companies to enter into DPA negotiations in May 2015. But this marks the first application by the SFO for approval of a DPA — as well as the first use of section 7 of UKBA.