Corporate & Securities Law

SEC Recognizes Company Blogs re Reg FD

By John Wallbillich

In a much-anticipated move, the SEC entered the web age this week. SEC special counsel Kim McManus outlined a commission guidance on using company web sites for Reg FD purposes. The full interpretive release has not yet been issued.

Some commentators are expecting that the guidance will give companies clear direction on how investor information can be disseminated and also some protection against liability for comments on company blogs or hyperlinks to third-party information.

Others wonder if this move is a precursor to the end of the press release; it seems more likely to be evolutionary than revolutionary from the start.

A more important part of this SEC action may be in encouraging companies to release more user-friendly and interactive information on their websites, rather than just pounding EDGAR with PDFs.

This move was supported by many companies, but was spearheaded by Sun, including its GC Mike Dillon and CEO Jonathan Schwartz. I covered their filing with the SEC here (Mike’s initial post is here; that of Mr. Schwartz, is here).

A tip of the corporate disclosure cap to Sun for bringing this issue before the SEC.

Full post as published by The Wired GC on August 01, 2008 (boomark / email).