So massive changes to Sarbanes-Oxley are in the can with a new committee
stacked with business leaders and academics looking to recommend fixing the system? Think again.
Securities and Exchange Commission chairman Christopher Cox has provided testimony on Capitol Hill before the House Financial Services Committee that the Sarbanes-Oxley is so good that elements of it are being adopted by overseas regulators.
Actually, that isn't completely true. Yes, elements of Sarbanes-Oxley have been adopted overseas but check out the regimes in England and Australia and you'll see that the rules there are less hard-line. Unlike the US, the systems in other countries have more in-built flexibility.
If you want to watch the proceeding, pour yourself a coffee or a wine and watch it on C-Span.
Indeed, you'll get more out of that than reading about what Cox has to say.
The defence of SOX is pretty much in keeping with the line that Cox was trotting out last week when he was in Fort Worth addressing a meeting of state and federal regulators and investigators.
In an interview about the legislation, Cox said the focus on Section 404 was missing the point.
"There's no question Section 404 is unduly expensive. But SOX consists of much more than Section 404. The entirety of the scheme works. It focuses the attention of top management and directors on the need for reliable financial reporting. The major scandals we lived through in recent years were financial and accounting scandals, and a major piece was a failure to tell the whole story."
So once more, Cox is sending the message that massive changes just ain't gonna happen. Not on his watch.
This is unlikely to stop the line from the likes of Free Enterprise Fund chairman Mallory Factor to overhaul the law. Writing in the conservative weekly Human Events, Factor says at the very least it should be made optional, allowing some companies to opt out if they so wish.
Factor even suggests that Ford Motor Company is thinking of going private to escape Sarbanes-Oxley.
Like Cox, he's stretching the truth. Ford's problems have more to do with rising raw material costs, debt and declining market share.
At least, Factor hasn't said that Ford is sacking 40,000 workers that Moody's and S&P have pushed it deeper into junk status because of Sarbanes-Oxley. But then, a guy can only stretch a story so far.
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