Sarbanes-Oxley legislation and the private company: if not a marriage, then certainly an engagement

摘要

The US Congress' enactment of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) introduced a new era of corporate governance, including requirements for auditor independence, the restriction on firms engaging accounting firms for both auditing and consulting services, independence of firms' board committees, management's assessment of internal controls, and personal certification of financial reports by firms' CEOs and CFOs. With few exceptions (e.g. retaliation for whistle-blowing, altering or destroying documents to impede any federal investigation, increased liability for white collar crimes and securities fraud), SOX applies specifically to publicly-traded firms. In the USA, approximately 15,000 companies are subject to these guidelines.