New U.S. SEC Rules on Oil and Gas Disclosure May Increase Reserves Significantly

摘要

The US Security Exchange Commission (SEC) released its updated rules and regulations concerning the disclosure and reporting of oil and gas reserves on Dec 29,2008; they were published in their final form in the US Federal Register on January 14, 2009 [ 1 ]. The bipartisan Commission voted unanimously in favor of these new rules, which will go into effect on January 1, 2010. The new rules are important, because they directly or indirectly affect oil and gas companies worldwide. Companies that are registered or operating in the US, or whose shares are traded on US stock exchanges fall directly under these rules. However, in today's global economy the valuation of virtually all oil and gas companies and their ability to raise capital is affected by SEC rules. The author was part of an expert group advising the SEC on formulating the new rules. In this article, a short summary of the most important changes is given and own comments are included. The article follows the wording of the SEC very closely to allow the interested reader to easily refer back to the complete SEC document [1].