The freight train known as International Financial Reporting Standards for U.S. filers is gaining momentum—or is it? The Securities and Exchange Commission issued its proposed IFRS roadmap in November with a 90-day comment period. The Commission will wait until 2011 before it determines whether to proceed with rules mandating that U.S. companies adopt IFRS beginning […]
Louis M. Thompson
Posted inFrom the Archive
Say-on-Pay Looms; Cos Should Seek Shareholder Input
Most of Corporate America already knows that investors clamoring for more say over executive pay will be one of the big battles in the coming proxy season. Wise corporations should instead be bracing for exactly what investors will say when they have the chance. Expect a lot of four-letter words. This should catch nobody in […]
Posted inBoards & Shareholders
Transparency, Disclosure Should Be Top SEC Priorities
One has to wonder if the old Shakespearean saying “timing is all” will become a guiding factor in which direction the Securities and Exchange Commission will go with a new administration and Congress. We can reasonably assume that Congress will press the SEC to increase its enforcement efforts substantially, to go after those who manipulated […]
Posted inTechnology
Advanced IR Section Crucial to Corporate Websites
Last June, the director of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Division of Corporation Finance, John White, addressed the annual conference of the National Investor Relations Institute. His message: “Communications is a big theme for the SEC. Companies, more and more, are using corporate Websites to provide information that we require. We at the Commission are […]
Posted inBoards & Shareholders
Investor Relations Fixes in a Complex Economy
U.S. corporations are facing the most challenging environment for shareholder relations and communications since the recession of the early 1990s. Without question, the current economy is causing some companies to suffer from a “bunker mentality”—instead of going on the offense to tell their investors what their strategy is to deal with an uncertain economic environment, […]
Posted inBoards & Shareholders
Reforms That Favor Non-Financial Data
Significant public policy groups are jumping on a bandwagon to make corporate reporting more meaningful and useful and in a form that investors (institutional and individual alike) can digest in making better investment decisions. In the lead has been the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Advisory Committee on Improvements to Financial Reporting, which submitted its final […]
Posted inBoards & Shareholders
Learning From This Year’s Proxy Season
This is not just another review of the recent proxy season for lessons learned. Instead, it’s a wake-up call for Corporate America that a new brand of activist investor has arrived on the scene that may well call for a change in how boards communicate with their major investors. The “shareholder democracy” movement has been […]
Posted inTechnology
XBRL Meets Modern Investor Relations
Three years ago, the Securities and Exchange Commission introduced a financial reporting “tagging” concept called eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL). Seventeen pioneers—including 3M Company, Altria Group, Microsoft, Pfizer, and Xerox—volunteered to file their financial statements using XBRL, to see what this new technology could do. Fast forward to today. On May 14, the SEC voted […]
Posted inFrom the Archive
New CSR Paradigm: Share the Wealth, Blame
Corporate America is shifting from a business model where the shareholders who take all of the risk reign supreme to one in which shareholders share the social value limelight with other constituents: communities, suppliers, laborers, environmentalists, and the public. This is all occurring under the rubric of corporate social responsibility. Jeffrey Immelt, CEO of General […]
Posted inFrom the Archive
When Full Disclosure Still Isn’t Enough
Since 2001, most publicly held companies have viewed their legal disclosure obligation through the lens of Regulation Fair Disclosure. Reg FD was designed to stop the disclosure of material, non-public information—particularly earnings guidance—to a select group of analysts or investors and to level the playing field in disseminating material information. The evidence is pretty clear […]