Regulators and enforcement agencies continue as always to preach the mantra that corporations should voluntarily disclose instances of misconduct, but a new study is fueling the constant debate about what rewards corporations really get in exchange for confessing their sins.
The study reviewed financial restatements over the course of eight years, and found that the odds of punishment from the Securities and Exchange Commission actually increased for companies that conducted their own investigation and cooperated with the agency—although they ultimately paid smaller fines for doing so.
