SEC concedes ground on Sarbanes-Oxley
The US Securities and Exchange Commission has conceded ground to several countries over the extra-territorial powers contained in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.
Link: Foreign bodies confront SEC over Sarbanes-Oxley
The SEC yesterday bowed to pressures from countries such as Germany and Japan to maintain their current corporate governance practices, by proposing modifications to the recently established law.
Sarbanes-Oxley was expected to affect over 1,300 non-US companies that have listings on US stock exchanges.
One of the biggest concessions involved the independence of audit committees, which Germany objected to as its two-tier management structures often led to employee representatives making audit decisions.
Japan and Italy also complained that audit committees were not always staffed by board directors.