Cox may relieve Sarbanes-Oxley pain

[question everything]

Sunday, August 14, 2005

Cox may relieve Sarbanes-Oxley pain

Businesses, especially small ones, hope new SEC chief will ease heavy burdens of accountability act.

By JEFF COLLINS
The Orange County Register

(snip)

Cox, the former Newport Beach congressman who took the helm of the SEC just over a week ago, said he supports steps that the commission is taking to make accounting rules less burdensome for smaller companies.

(snip)

"We have to rely on the tender mercies of Chris Cox and the SEC, bless their hearts," Oxley, R-Ohio, told local corporate directors at a dinner Monday in Newport Beach. "The change in (SEC) leadership couldn't come at a more critical time, and Chris Cox will delve into that."

Oxley is critical of the final version of his bill, saying lawmakers went a little too far in their frenzy to restore investor confidence in the wake of corporate scandals involving companies such as Enron and WorldCom.

The SEC originally forecast that compliance would cost $91,000 per company, but it's actually averaging more than $4.3 million, according to a survey by the Financial Executives International, an organization of financial officers. Several studies show that the burden is up to 50 times greater for smaller companies, where compliance costs represent a larger percentage of revenue.

(snip)

http://www.ocregister.com/ocr/2005/08/14/sections/business/your_money/article_634073.php

[LoZoccolo]

1. I'd question the $91k vs. $4.3 million comparison.

I don't know how the figures were arrived at, but if you looked at them, you might find they're comparing figures for arriving at compliance to an estimated maintenance cost.

[musette_sf]

3. I don't pay the bills where I work but

I think there is some number closer to the $4.3M, instead of $91K, for many large corporations, for implementation and compliance alone.

SOX is a windfall for big consultancies, for the most part, who have been looking for a new gravy train to ride since Y2K. The consultancies seem to be determining what constitutes compliance, rather than the actual legislation itself.

For the sheer amount of BS that IT departments have to go through for compliance, you would think it was WorldCom's IT VP who had been tried and convicted, not Bernie Ebbers.

:shrug:

[norml]

6. You don't believe their numbers?

What reason would you have to doubt the numbers put out by a PAC of CEOs and CFOs.

[msongs]

2. the political version of internet file sharing/music theft so lots of DU

people should be very happy to hear about Cox taking over. He is right in the same mold. After all as read here music theft is a right of the listener so corporate theft is the right of the corporations and their lackeys.

Msongs
www.msongs.com/political-shirts.htm

[PurityOfEssence]

4. Ooh, that's a hot one

Yep, lots is said about the selfishness of the right, but little is said here about the selfishness of the left. There is no moral justification for file sharing, just as there is no legal one. When one buys the CD--pardon my quaint and old-fashioned ways--the package says that it's for you and you alone. You can sell the CD itself, but that's it. Using it without permission for any gain--even the bartering of file-sharing--is a violation of the agreement you made when you bought it.

Lest we forget, too: when one has actually broken a law, one is usually long past the point of immorality. The law is just an extreme stopgap barrier.

Cox should be in jail for some of his business dealings, and he typifies the bullying superiority of reactionaries: I should get to take as I please, and if inferiors get fleeced in the process, I'm doing it for the good of god's holy order, wherein the gullible should be ruined. Modern conservatism is sheer primitiveness. Laws and regulations are the sign of an advanced society trying to protect itself from criminals. Money-grubbing thugs consider themselves anointed with a grace that puts them above the laws of mere peasants.

Now, obviously you've got a bit of an ax to grind and are stretching the subject here to do some more honing, but it's an important one, and it shows the duality of the powerful and powerless. The strong see no reason to be bounded by annoying laws of comportment, and the weak feel every justification to stick it to the man because they've been so mistreated.

People are remarkably similar, aren't they?

[norml]

5. If we could trust numbers put out by Financial Executives International

there wouldn't have been a need for such regulations in the first place.

[lovuian]

7. I'll just say Enron and WorldCom etc... etc...

Congress had to institute it to get investors to place the money in companies again... And probably will be weakened.

[depakid]

8. Welp, the Dems allowed him in- so I blame them

for the inevitable corruption that occurs....

They've given Bush every single thing that he's wanted with hardly even a fight, so there's not much they'll be able to say come next election time except- "Hey, we're not Republicans."

I doubt that'll be any more successful this time around than it has in the past.