American corporations spend billions of dollars every year on compliance programs, which do help to protect them from lawsuits and regulatory actions.

But, poorly implemented compliance programs can be worse than useless, giving companies false confidence in their effectiveness. In a recent example of this, Goldman Sachs was fined over $2.9 billion by U.S. regulators in connection with the 1MBD scandal, with additional substantial fines and penalties being imposed by foreign governments. As shown by documents recently revealed in US v. Roger Ng, 18-CR-538 (MKB), some part of these fines may be attributable to the aggressive positions Goldman took with regulators regarding the effectiveness of its compliance programs, which it ultimately retreated from in reaching a settlement.