The accessibility and popularity of the Internet has seen the corporate/ investor web site move to the front line of disclosure. To protect the interests of both the broader investment public and the issuer, companies must ensure the same stringent approach toward web site disclosure as they do to ensure accuracy in core documents.
One very compelling reason to do so is the fact that material information extends beyond regulatory filings and core documents to potentially any communication. Information is material if its `omission or misstatement could influence a reasonable investor’s …

A study recently released by the Queen’s School of Business says that Canada’s 10 provincial and three territorial regulators seemingly fail to consistently enforce even the few guidelines they agree upon, such as disclosure controls and procedures effectiveness opinions, compared to the United States model, where a single, well-funded and rigorous national securities regulator successfully enforces laws that require transparent control safeguards.
Key findings:

Among the study’s sample of companies that are solely listed on the TSX, almost one in 10 (nine per cent) do not disclose anything about internal control design …

On October 19th the SEC announced that checks totaling more than $356 million were sent in the mail to investors harmed by the financial fraud at Fannie Mae (Federal National Mortgage Association) between 1998 and 2004. With today’s payments, the SEC has distributed more than $3 billion overall since the agency was given authority to send financial penalties from SEC enforcement actions to the victims of financial fraud.
“The SEC is continuing to make highly effective use of the authority provided by Congress in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act to return more money …

Since Bill 198 became law back in the early part of 2006 there have been many different perspectives regarding what this means to directors and officers and how companies manage their secondary market disclosure.
Since our inception in 2005 we have had numerous regulators, consultants and customers support our position that companies should maintain records of what is being disclosed through the corporate web site.
Here is a quote from a recent customer: “The web site is now accepted as the main communication vehicle with the public and has the potential to …

I just came across a great article on computer world titled Sarbanes-Oxley compliance costs drop, better processes credited . Here’s a slightly paraphrased version:
Couple of studies have come out stating Sarbanes-Oxley costs are going down. The latest, according to a survey by Financial Executives International. The Florham Park, N.J.-based organization found the average company spent $2.9 million on SOX compliance in 2006, versus $3.8 million in 2005 and $4.5 million in 2004. – 23% reduction. The prime driver for this reduction is based on companies automating their controls
“Technology has a …

According to the Financial Times, Christopher Cox announced yesterday that the SEC is going to formalize a new rule to require all companies to report financial information in XBRL.
This is not surprising, especially considering the consistent messages we’ve been hearing from Cox regarding the benefits of interactive data (aka XBRL) it seemed just a matter of time until it was to be mandated. As of today there’s been no mentioned about when this rule will be put in place and it’s not formally listed on the SEC web site.
Cox said …

I just finished reading this article about the concept of mash ups coming to the Goverance, Risk and Compliance (GRC) space. “Mashups” as defined on wikipedia is “A mashup is a website or application that combines content from more than one source into an integrated experience.”
 
The concept comes form the Web 2.0 culture and it generally refers to web application and their content being combined to form new and useful tools. If you’re interested you can find lots of great mashups here.
Here’s a brief quote from the GRC mashup article …

We had the opportunity to meet with a very senior executive from one of the big 5 consulting firms today regarding CEO/CFO certification of disclosure controls and procdures (DCP). Certification of DCP relates to Sarbanes-Oxley 302 and CSA’s MI 52-109 legislation. It was a very insightful meeting and allowed us to gain a further understanding of how our software can help companies in establishing and managing effective DCP. A couple of interesting points:
1. The corporate web site continues to increase in importance
More and more, the first place that shareholders, stakeholders, regulators …

A study commissioned by Symantec Corp. revealed today that only 10 per cent of executives believe Canadian businesses are fully prepared to conform to Bill 198 and MI 52-109 compliance legislation.
The press release goes on to say that senior compliance professionals from Symantec advise executives to consider the benefits offered by software-based automation tools intended to make financial disclosure less labour intensive and less expensive to prove compliance to auditors and regulators. 
“Meeting first-year Bill 198 deadlines was only half the battle, and, unfortunately, a high level of both inaction and resistance …

Following the lead of the SEC’s voluntary XBRL program success last year, the CSA has introduced a similar XBRL voluntary filing program effective May 2007. 
Reporting issuers participating in the voluntary program will file financial statements in XBRL format on SEDAR. Under the current continuous disclosure requirements, these issuers must also continue filing their official financial statements in PDF format on SEDAR. The CSA will make the XBRL financial statements available to the public through the SEDAR website at www.sedar.com.
I think it’s great that Canadian regulators (and SEDAR) are putting this …