Chapter 8. Reports to the Securities and Exchange Commission
The CFO of any publicly held company must deal with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) certainly on a quarterly basis, and frequently as much as once a week on a variety of topics. Given the frequency of interaction, it is useful to have an overview of the SEC, as well as learn about the principal legislation under which it gains its authority, its primary regulations, and the most common forms submitted by public companies to the SEC.
Overview[*]
The SEC was created as a direct result of the stock market crash of October 1929. Given the massive loss of net worth as a result of the plunge in stock market prices at that time, the federal government felt that a considerable degree of regulation over the securities industry was necessary in order to ensure that the resulting increase in public confidence in the markets would eventually draw them back to it.
After a series of hearings to determine what specific forms of regulation would meet this goal, Congress passed the Securities Act and the Securities Exchange Act in 1933 and 1934, respectively. As noted next in this chapter, the two acts were designed to greatly increase the information reported by an entity issuing securities (especially the nature of its business and any associated investment risks), as well as the amount of oversight by the government. The oversight function was centered on the regulation of the markets in which securities were sold, as well ...
Become an O’Reilly member and get unlimited access to this title plus top books and audiobooks from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers, thousands of courses curated by job role, 150+ live events each month,
and much more.
Read now
Unlock full access