TheCorporateCounsel.net

December 14, 2012

More on “Chaos in the SEC’s Inspector General’s Office: ‘He Said, They Said'”

Back in May, I blogged about the madness in the SEC’s Inspector General’s Office. The David Kotz and David Weber show. A soap opera at the SEC like this comes along only once every few generations!

The latest is that former Assistant Inspector General Weber has filed a $20 million lawsuit alleging he was fired for being a whistleblower. And the complaint is full of juicy details (which may – or may not – be true). Here are some articles on this development:

Rolling Stone’s “SEC Rocked By Lurid Sex-and-Corruption Lawsuit”

Business Insider’s “SEC Whistleblower Suit: Sex, Lies, Stupidity, Oh My!!”

Courthouse News Service’s “Former Top Official Files Scorching Complaint Against SEC”

Huffington Post’s “David Weber Lawsuit: Ex-SEC Investigator Accused Of Wanting To Carry A Gun At Work, Suing For $20 Million”

Bloomberg’s “SEC Sued by Fired Investigator Who Alleged Ethical Lapses”

ThomsonReuter’s “A cautionary tale for whistle-blowers, from the SEC’s own ranks”

As a U. of Michigan grad, I’m very excited about their hoops team this year – particularly our Canadian freshman Nik Stauskas. Here is a video of what he did for Thanksgiving. Unbelievable talent and dedication…

PCAOB Issues Report on the State of Internal Controls

A few days ago, the PCAOB released a report summarizing observations from its inspections of audits performed by the 8 largest public accounting firms of their clients’ internal control over financial reporting in 2010. As noted in this blog by the FEI, there is a concern over the increasing rate of deficiencies – up to 22% in ’11 from 15% in ’10.

Looking for something different for the new year? Learn about the “Lowell Milken Institute Law Teaching Fellowship” opportunity at UCLA School of Law.

Iran Sanction Related Disclosures

In this podcast, Abram Ellis of Simpson Thacher & Bartlett explains the latest developments relating to Iran sanctions and disclosure, including

– How do the recent changes to the U.S.’s economic sanctions related to Iran implicates disclosures?
– What does it mean when you say an issuer must report the activities of affiliates? What’s included in that?
– What types of activities need to be disclosed?
– How detailed do the disclosures need to be?
– Anything else we should know about the disclosure requirements?

– Broc Romanek