French Investigator Seeks Information About Formula One Sale

Financial corruption investigators in France are examining the role played by the world governing body for motor sports in the $4.4 billion sale of the Formula One auto-racing series, according to two people familiar with the inquiry.

Investigators want to know if the Federation Internationale de l’Automobile, which is based in Paris and commonly referred to as the F.I.A., had a conflict of interest when it agreed to clear the sale of Formula One to Liberty Media, the cable conglomerate controlled by the American billionaire John C. Malone. Accounting for debt, Liberty’s takeover totaled more than $8 billion, making it one of the biggest transactions in sports. read more »

CFTC's LabCFTC Releases Primer on Virtual Currencies

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s LabCFTC today released, “A CFTC Primer on Virtual Currencies.” This primer is the first of a series that LabCFTC will release to provide fundamental, and essential, information about financial technology (FinTech) innovation.

“LabCFTC believes that promoting education, understanding, and regulatory clarity around emerging technologies can help facilitate market-enhancing innovation and guard against risks,” said the Director of LabCFTC, Daniel Gorfine, adding, “As people worldwide try to understand and wrap their heads around the virtual currency ecosystem, we thought it timely and important for our first primer to help explain the space, identify how developments involve the CFTC, and highlight risks that investors or users of virtual currencies should carefully consider.” read more »

FEMA Is Spending Billions, and Some Questionable Companies Are Getting Work

A surge in disaster contracts from hurricanes has put the agency under pressure to bypass the usual competitive bidding process.

This year’s record hurricane season has led to the biggest spike in government disaster contracts in more than a decade, testing the government’s ability to manage the unpredictable and growing costs of climate change. Since Hurricane Harvey struck Texas on Aug. 25, the Federal Emergency Management Agency has awarded $2.2 billion in contracts, according to data compiled by Bloomberg Government. That’s about twice what the agency typically awards over an entire year.

With parts of Florida, Texas, and Puerto Rico in desperate need of help, FEMA is under pressure to put money to work as fast as possible. One way to speed things up is to bypass the usual competitive bidding process. In the fiscal year ended Sept. 30, FEMA awarded $178 million in noncompete contracts, more than twice as much as the year before. The danger in sidestepping competitive bidding is that the government may pay more than it needs to and that companies may not get the necessary scrutiny. read more »