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Looks at attempts to avoid Sarbanes‐Oxley guidelines over past few years. It has been widely reported, for example, that the number of public companies announcing their intention to privatize has increased 30 percent since the enactment of SOX. Some other companies will elect not to seek initial public offerings but will remain private enterprises.

Private firms have so far avoided such Sarbanes‐Oxley regulations changes. Pressure is mounting, however, to ensure that whether public or private, firms operate in compliance with SOX. Some states are considering Sarbanes‐Oxley‐like legislation.

Provides managers with information on progress toward applying Sarbanes‐Oxley guidelines to private corporations.

Of particular value to CEOs and other board members.

In light of the increasing convergence between public and private sector accounting models, should local governments be required to adopt requirements similar to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX)? Survey results from 42.2% of municipal finance officers from Ohio and Florida suggest they embrace in concept the enhanced accountability resulting from adopting principal officer certification (POC) and the independent audit committee (IAC) for larger cities. However, like their counterparts in the private sector, they have reservations regarding the benefits of implementation relative to costs. Theories of innovation diffusion and planned behavior provided a theoretical framework for multivariate analysis. The contradictions in our findings may relate to respondents’ reservations regarding the private sector financial reporting model that is becoming increasingly prevalent in public financial management.

In this study we examine the oversight responsibilities of audit committees in the post Sarbanes‐Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) era. The results show that audit committee oversight responsibilities assigned and disclosed in proxy statements expanded post‐SOX compared to pre‐SOX. We design a survey instrument to measure the difference between the perceived oversight responsibilities of audit committee members and the oversight responsibilities actually assigned in the proxy. Our results indicate that although audit committees made a substantial commitment to increase their assigned responsibilities over the period of 2001 to 2004, they still need to do more to meet the many additional challenges facing them in a post‐SOX environment. Overall, our results suggest that the intent of SOX‐for audit committees to be more involved and active in the oversight role of an organization‐is becoming institutionalized. These results should be interesting to policy makers, a variety of interest groups, and accounting researchers.

The purpose of this paper is to draw attention to the fact that the certainty equivalent coefficient net present value criterion, CEC(NPV), in disregarding a fundamental requirement for the calculation of cash flows for purposes of discounted cash flow analysis, invalidates this capital budgeting criterion from the perspective of sound research methodology. The paper also investigates the impact of the UK Companies Act of 2006, the Sarbanes‐Oxley Act of 2002, and important reviews such as the Turner Review of 2009, the Walker Review of 2009, and the Review of the Combined Code of 2009 on this operationally invalid capital budgeting criterion, as well as its impact on the process of financial managerial decision making.

The CEC(NPV) as a discounted cash flow capital budgeting criterion was examined from the perspective of the axioms of cash flow estimation as well as from the definition of the cost of capital in order to ascertain the contribution of this criterion to financial management. The relevant sections of the UK Companies Act of 2006, the Sarbanes‐Oxley Act of 2002, the Turner Review of 2009, the Walker Review of 2009, and the Review of the Combined Code of 2009 were studied in order to establish whether the CEC(NPV) was able to satisfy the requirements of this legislation and these important reviews.

The CEC(NPV) is construct invalid and does not measure what it purports to measure: it over‐states financial viability. As a consequence, it does not meet the requirements of sound research methodology and therefore is at odds with the UK Companies Act of 2006, the Sarbanes‐Oxley Act of 2002, and falls foul of the Turner Review of 2009, the Walker Review of 2009, the 2009 Review of the Combined Code issued by the Financial Reporting Council. As such it cannot be endorsed by the Financial Services Authority.

The paper usefully shows that the CEC(NPV) denies financial managers application of Fisherian analysis for resolving conflicts in the rankings of mutually exclusive projects, and, the comparison of project cost of capital with their respective internal rates of return. Comparisons of the internal rate of return, not with the risk‐free rate (that is assumed to be a constant and which exhibits minimal variability in comparison with the cost of capital), but with the cost of capital cost of capital, are a sine qua non for managerial decision making, especially capital budgeting.

The Sarbanes‐Oxley Act has celebrated its fifth anniversary. This paper aims to discuss the effectiveness and usefulness to the accounting profession and the investing community of the reforms set forth in the Act.

Various components of the Sarbanes‐Oxley Act of 2002 are explored in detail, predominantly those dealing with corporate governance and internal controls. Discussions with practicing certified public accountants along with opinions from other professionals in the investing community are used to gain insight into the Act's effects on those who work its provisions on a daily basis.

Differing opinions exist as to the effects of the reforms on the accounting profession, financial reporting, capital markets, and ultimately, investor confidence. Some experts feel the reforms are helping to restore investor confidence in issuer's financial statements while others feel the cost of compliance with the Act's reforms exceed the benefits.

Implementation of the Act's reforms are not without controversy. This paper highlights the need for investors to understand the nature and issues surrounding the reforms to help increase investor confidence in the financial markets.

This paper reviews the origins of the Act's reforms and their intended purpose. A better understanding of the reforms and discussions with experts in the business community allows investors to determine the effectiveness and usefulness of the Act.

The purpose of this article is to investigate whether economic value added (EVA^®) is a superior financial performance metric and creates market value added (MVA), as claimed by Stern Stewart and Company, and therefore is consistent with the purpose and intent of the UK Companies Act of 2006 and the Sarbanes‐Oxley Act of 2002. If these claims can be sustained, then it could be argued that this valuation metric should form part of the Business Review, Section 417 of the UK Companies Act of 2006, and furthermore it could be an appropriate approach to the attainment of the corporate objective of the UK Companies Act of 2006, Section 172(1).

A survey was undertaken of journal articles published in mainstream academic journals from 1997 to 2008 that investigated the claims of Stern Stewart and Company that EVA^® was a superior financial performance metric vis‐à‐vis other well‐established accounting and financial metrics. As the empirical evidence in support of these claims was not compelling, the epistemology and methodology of EVA^® were examined, and were found to be deficient.

There is insufficient supportive evidence to validate the claims of EVA^®; furthermore, from the perspective of epistemology and sound research methodology it is not possible to make a robust case for the unqualified use of EVA^® in jurisdictions where the UK Companies Act of 2006 and the Sarbanes‐Oxley Act of 2002 apply. Directors who make unqualified use of this financial performance metric place themselves at unnecessary risk.

There is no evidence from the scrutiny of publicly available secondary sources to indicate that the implications of the UK Companies Act of 2006 and the Sarbanes‐Oxley Act of 2002, for the use of the financial performance valuation metric, EVA^®, has been previously undertaken or published.

The pursuit of good corporate governance, as exemplified by compliance with Sarbanes‐Oxley (SOX), requires corporate real estate (CRE) departments to gain a better understanding of asset values and lease costs than most companies currently possess. As a result, CRE departments are motivated to centralise control over operations globally, to improve systems for ensuring consistent and accurate accounting worldwide and to scrutinise vendors more thoroughly. These changes will be difficult for many CRE departments, but, done properly, the focus on corporate governance will bring greater understanding of real estate’s impact on corporate financial performance, as well as enhancing relationships with the CFO, senior management and business unit leaders.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of the Enron scandal, Arthur Andersen's demise and the Sarbanes‐Oxley Act on audit fees.

The paper uses empirical methodology (univariate and multivariate).

Audit fees and the Big‐4 premium increased in 2002. Increase was larger for bigger and riskier clients. Evidence is also consistent with a competitive market for former Andersen clients.

Data requirements might bias the sample towards larger sized firms. Data availability limits the number of observations.

The research findings on audit fees in post‐Enron and Arthur Andersen period reported in this paper are important for policy makers.

It is found that the premium charged by Big 4 over non‐Big 4 has increased in 2002, and that the ability of an auditor to charge a premium is adversely affected when its reputation is tarnished. It is also reported that the frequency of voluntary switches within the Big 4 is lowest in 19 years. The audit fee model was also refined by adding two ownership variables to control for agency aspect of client firms; inside and institutional ownership.

“Real‐time” enforcement has been the hallmark of Harvey Pitt’s tenure as Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC” or “Commission”). However, real‐time enforcement cannot succeed without real‐time knowledge of securities law violations. To foster early disclosure of possible wrongdoing, the SEC has emphasized the desirability of corporate cooperation through early self‐detection, self‐correction, and self‐reporting. Now, key provisions of the Sarbanes‐Oxley Act of 2002 will make such cooperation more likely, by changing some of the basic ways that corporate directors, officers, employees, accountants, and attorneys deal with each other.

The purpose of this paper is to empirically demonstrate that drivers of venture capital (VC) investments are different across three broadly defined sectors: high-technology manufacturing, medium-technology manufacturing and services, and low-technology services. Moreover, such differences also exist across industries within each of these sectors.

The basic hypothesis is that “not only different stages of VC investments have different drivers, but VC investments in different sectors of the economy are also driven by different drivers.” The paper tests this hypothesis using a Poterba (1989) type supply and demand framework in the multivariate time-series regression analysis.

This paper empirically demonstrates that drivers of VC investments are different across three broadly defined sectors: high-technology manufacturing, medium-technology manufacturing and services, and low-technology services. Moreover, such differences also exist by stages of investment and across industries within each of these sectors. In particular, the paper finds that the importance of the number of VC-led initial public offering (IPO) transactions as the main driver of VC investment decreases with the level of technology involved in the sector. IPO transactions are particularly important in software, networking and equipment, and business products and services industries. In contrast to earlier literature, however, the paper do not find a more pronounced effect of IPOs for seed and late stages of VC investments. Similarly, the positive impact Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 – which mainly impacts public companies – also intensifies with a decrease in the level of technology involved in the sector, and the paper do not find a negative impact. The Act is important particularly for VC investments in medium- and low-tech sectors and in early or expansion stages.

In analyzing the determinants of VC in a supply and demand framework as in Poterba (1989), the paper differentiates between different sectors (17 industries) and stages of VC (four stages: seed, early, expansion, late). Such level of differentiation is novel and allows more refined and better targeted public policy measures.