We all recognise that the US corporate regulatory landscape has changed dramatically in the past 18 months and we also all recognise that the full impact of this change will not be fully felt or understood for some time. That having been said, corporate regulation is certainly not a new phenomenon. We view the recent wave of regulation – the Sarbanes-Oxley Act – as part of a ‘pendulum of regulation’ that swings back and forth through the years.
In times of turmoil, the pendulum tends to swing towards a hands-on approach in which laws and regulations are enacted to combat specific problems in the market and to bolster consumer and investor confidence.
