The Securities and Exchange Commission doesn’t regulate everything a public company does. Or does it?
SEC practitioners are grappling with that question in the wake of the agency’s recent $35 million settlement with video game developer Activision Blizzard, where the SEC leveraged an inconspicuous internal controls rule to sanction alleged corporate conduct that had no evident impact on the company’s public reporting. Despite the hefty civil penalty, the Activision settlement does not entail allegations of fraud or deceit, or that Activision misstated or omitted anything at all. There are also no allegations that investors were harmed or put at risk.