A stressed economy and new regulations propelled federal regulators to issue record levels of regulatory changes in 2011. Companies can expect those numbers to continue to rise in 2012, according to a recent report conducted by the Governance, Risk and Compliance business unit of Thomson Reuters.

Jaclyn Jaeger is a freelance contributor to Compliance Week after working for the company for 15 years. She writes on a wide variety of topics, including ethics and compliance, risk management, legal,...