October 10, 2017
Today’s Webcast: “E&S Disclosures – The In-House Perspective”
Tune in today for the webcast – “E&S Disclosures: The In-House Perspective” – to hear National Vision’s Jared Brandman, Davis Polk’s Ning Chiu, Bristol-Myers Squibb’s Kate Kelly, Apple’s Jung-Kyu McCann and Clorox’s Stephanie Tang discuss environmental & social disclosure issues – in both SEC filings & other types of filings.
SASB Proposes ESG Disclosure Standards
As Ning notes in her blog, the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) released draft standards for Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) disclosure last week, launching a 90-day public comment period which ends on December 31st. Four years in the making, these standards set forth ESG topics covering 11 different sectors and 79 industries for public companies to disclose annually.
Ning has a link to where the exposure draft resides. I decided not to do so – because I’m dismayed that one can only receive a copy if you fill out a form. Studies show that downloads of documents dramatically go down if you force people into providing their personal information – even if the document is free. I dislike this practice – particularly for something like this that has a regulatory feel…
Heads Up! Legal Entity Identifier (LEI)/MiFID II Deadline
A member recently asked in our “Q&A Forum” (#9237): “It appears that several EU firms are reaching out to U.S. public companies to obtain a Legal Entity Identifier (LEI) in advance of the new EU financial markets regulation (MiFID II and MiFIR) becoming effective (or risk that company shares cannot be traded in Europe after January 3, 2018). Are public companies applying for LEI’s, and if so, how? It looks like Bloomberg is an accredited issuer of LEIs as a Local Operating Unit (LOU), but I’m just trying to get a handle on how other public companies are responding any why.”
I asked a few in-house friends about this – and they were unaware of this requirement. We posited some potential thoughts on this topic in response to the query in the “Q&A Forum” – and now the first law firm memo is out about it. Send more!
– Broc Romanek