"Floyd Norris has the details. Under the guise of helping small businesses, the accounting requirements of Sarbanes-Oxley are being watered down to near nothing." - Andrew C from Bookmarklet

"This is a shameless attempt for a freer hand to avoid responsibility and correct marking of assets. If we really wanted to just help small companies reduce their reporting burdens and maintain acceptable financial controls, how hard is it to exempt an appropriate number of firms with modest revenue. Instead, this is yet another grab for control by the same groups that helped caused the previosu accounting crisis in the 1990s and 2000s. The gall is simply unimaginable." - Andrew C

Norris: "The House Financial Services Committee this week approved an amendment to the Investor Protection Act of 2009 -- a name George Orwell would appreciate -- to allow most companies to never comply with the law, and mandating a study to see whether it would be a good idea to exempt additional ones as well." - Andrew C

"They also suggested that more foreign companies would list their securities in the United States if they were spared that onerous requirement. No one seems to have asked if investors really would benefit from making it easier to invest in companies that fear such an audit." - Andrew C

The accounting requirements of SOX don't do anything to prevent fraud anyhow...They need to actually tighten enforcement of companies and not simply ask companies to do better accounting. - Alex Scoble

I thought there was some deterrent effect by putting the CFO/CEOs personally on the line for the quality of the accounting? - Andrew C

It didn't stop Madoff or the banking scandals...The only thing that deters fraud is good enforcement. - Alex Scoble

As Ritholtz points out, though, the banking scandals were aided by explicit waivers from certain regulations. - Andrew C