Four years following its passage, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act remains a controversial measure to improve corporate governance and financial reporting—usually described by critics as so draconian it will turn companies away from capital markets in pursuit of cheaper, easier-to-obtain capital.
Yet one bit of recent research suggests just the opposite: that smaller companies are listing on U.S. exchanges in record numbers, regardless of the nettlesome SOX-compliance audits looming for them in 2007.
