The SEC is proposing Rule 13q-1 and an amendment to Form SD to implement Section 1504 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (the “DoddFrank Act”) relating to disclosure of payments by resource extraction issuers. Section 1504 of the Dodd-Frank Act added Section 13(q) to the Securities... Read More
The SEC has proposed amendments to the definition of “accredited investor” to add new categories of qualifying natural persons and entities and to make certain other modifications to the existing definition. Specifically, the proposed amendments: would add new categories of natural persons that may qualify as accredited investors based on... Read More
The PCAOB announced it has conducted a limited review of audit reports of large accelerated filers reporting critical audit matters or CAMs. As a starting matter, the PCAOB’s report seems to implicitly and perhaps explicitly assume that its audit standard requiring the reporting of CAMs provides “more useful and timely... Read More
Nasdaq has proposed new Rule 5120 permitting Nasdaq to halt trading in a security and request information from the company regarding the number of unrestricted publicly held shares when Nasdaq observes unusual trading characteristics in a security or a company announces an event that may cause a contraction in the... Read More
ISS has announced its 2020 policy updates. The summary below is largely extracted from ISS’ executive summary or the commentary in the updated policies. US – Problematic Governance Structure – Newly Public Companies ISS seeks to provide clarity on policy application at newly-public companies by creating two distinct policies that... Read More
At an open meeting on November 5th, SEC Commissioners voted 3-2 to propose potentially significant changes to the shareholder proposals process under Rule 14a-8 with respect to the bases upon which issuers can seek to omit shareholder proposal from their proxy materials. The proposed amendments to the shareholder proposal process... Read More
PWP Xerion Holdings III LLC v Red Leaf Resources, Inc. discussed disputed consent rights in connection with a joint venture. In so doing, Vice Chancellor Laster had to consider the meaning of the word “affiliate.” Citing Websters, the Court noted under the plain meaning of the term, someone “affiliated” with... Read More
ISS announced the launch of its benchmark voting policy comment period which will help set policy for the upcoming proxy season. The draft policy takes the format with the existing policy in a left column with black line changes and the clean updated policy in the right column followed by... Read More
The Energy and Environment Legal Institute has requested the SEC to take appropriate action to prevent and prohibit registrants from making materially false and misleading claims and statements related to global climate change. As support for its cause, the Institute refers to a press release by a public company and... Read More
In a settled enforcement action, the SEC resolved allegations related to non-monetary transactions regarding certain Comscore transactions. The enforcement action also involved disclosures surrounding the number of customers. In 2014 and 2015, Comscore disclosed its total number of customers and net new customers added in quarterly earnings calls. Comscore also... Read More