Pitt seeks compromise over Sarbanes-Oxley
The SEC chairman has left the door open for compromise on controversial financial regulation, but could expect the European Union to make similar compromises.
Link: Hewitt tells US to lay UK firms
Speaking at a conference in Brussels, Harvey Pitt said the SEC would be listening to the concerns of foreign companies listed on the US capital markets as well as those of foreign regulators.
But he warned that the EC should not seek to impose its own standards on US firms through the proposed directive on supervision of financial conglomerates.
‘The EC would do well to ward against the possible extraterritorial imposition on US firms by the EC in the form of equivalence determinations,’ he said.
On the registration of foreign audit firms at the SEC, Pitt said: ‘These concerns deserve, and will receive, our careful consideration.’ But the SEC chairman said that many of the reforms in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act could be of potential value in Europe.