Saturday, August 18, 2007

Sarbox Was the Right Medicine


As Sarbanes-Oxley turns five this summer, the controversial act is once again being put under a high-powered microscope. Has it been the transformative law that supporters -- prominently including Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson -- claim has restored investor confidence and helped corporate America move out from the ugly shadow of Enron, WorldCom and other epic-sized scandals? Or, as detractors argue, is it a roadblock to the competitiveness of the U.S. capital markets by virtue of its outsized cost of compliance?

The last five years have made it irrefutably clear. Sarbanes-Oxley (Sarbox) is a textbook case of how regulation should ideally ...

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