Text of the article:
*Raytheon Technology Corp. (RTX) has been assessed a $200 million fine for violating export laws involving exchanging information on U.S. combat aircraft with prohibited countries. The laws are associated with the International Traffic in Arm Regulations. According to the U.S. State Department, RTX is guilty of improperly classifying and controlling exports of defense articles, including classified material.
Sensitive information on the F-22 Raptor, F-35 Lightning II, and B-2 Spirit bomber was mistakenly made available to Russia, China, and Iran.
According to a Reuters report, RTX voluntarily disclosed its errors. At a July 25 earnings call with investors, the company said it had earmarked $1 billion to resolve three separate legal issues that it said were primarily identified during the integration of firms Rockwell Collins and Raytheon/United Technologies into RTX in April 2020.
According to a U.S. State Department document released last week, one of the transgressions involved providing Chinese nationals in Shanghai with information that was more sensitive than RTX employees realized on “an aluminum display housing component of the F-22 Raptor Fighter Aircraft.”
On the earnings call, RTX told investors, "As part of the resolution of each of these three matters, we will be required to retain independent compliance monitors over the three-year term of the agreements." Half of the fine will be spent to fund a remedial compliance program.*
Own take:
First of all, hahahahaha!! This is what you get for being such a free market fundamentalist shithole that you leave war production in the hands of the private sector! Also China wins again by doing absolutely nothing lol
I think this punishment is extremely lenient considering this could be viewed as treason. It's barely .012% of their market cap, so it's like a speeding ticket for a normal person. Also it mentions they are having three other violations at the same time, so this is apparently a regular occurrence. In my opinion, this just goes to show how deep the US government is in the pocket of these companies.
