Archive
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SEC’s Peirce raises concerns over CCO liability
Commissioner suggests need for more guidance SEC member Hester Peirce has raised concerns about the potential regulatory liabilities facing chief compliance officers (CCOs) and has suggested the commission – and the compliance profession – develop new guidance. In a speech earlier this month, Peirce said she shared fears some observers have raised that a growing ‘specter of personal liability’ may lead to some talented individuals giving up a career in compliance. She noted that the New York City Bar earlier in 2020 published a report outlining this and other issues and offering recommendations. The question of how to define CCOs’…
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Investors miss field trips under Covid-19
‘Touch and feel’ events are big loss under pandemic’s social restrictions, professionals say Although the switch to virtual investor relations (IR) during the Covid-19 pandemic has brought a number of benefits, investor field trips are an option hard to reproduce, and may be one of the first events brought back when in-person gatherings are possible again, according to panelists at the IR Magazine Forum – Canada 2020 hosted by Compliance Reporter’s sister publication. In a session on investor targeting, panelists from IR teams and the buy side discussed how the pandemic has brought benefits and drawbacks to investor outreach. Initially…
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Neoleukin Therapeutics appoints first general counsel
Holly Vance previously worked at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Seattle-based Neoleukin Therapeutics has hired Holly Vance as general counsel. She is the first person to hold that position with the company, according to a spokesperson. Vance was previously at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, where she was associate general counsel and provided legal and strategic advice on investments and transactions to the foundation’s Strategic Investment Fund with a focus on the life sciences sector. Before her time at the Gates Foundation, Vance was a partner in the Seattle office of law firm K&L Gates, practicing corporate and…
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The week in GRC: SEC changes auditor independence rules, and Yale investment chief seeks money manager diversity
This week’s governance, compliance and risk-management stories from around the web – Reuters reported that, according to lawyers, lobbyists and policy experts, a decade-long Republican campaign to weaken the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) independence would backfire if Democrat Joe Biden wins the presidential election and gains the power to replace the agency’s director with a consumer champion. The Trump administration has relaxed enforcement and some rules and successfully asked the US Supreme Court to decide whether the president should have discretionary power to fire the CFPB’s director, as Republicans have argued. That landmark decision would also give a Biden…
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Helping Canadian boards amid Covid-19 and the challenges ahead
Highlights from last week’s Corporate Secretary Forum – Canada More than 100 governance professionals gathered online last Thursday for the Corporate Secretary Forum – Canada to discuss how general counsel, corporate secretaries and boards have responded to the Covid-19 pandemic to tackle the challenges it raises, the lessons they have learned – and what that means for governance teams going into 2021. In the governance world, as elsewhere, the crisis has brought the wellbeing, treatment and importance of people to the fore. This is seen in the intense focus on human capital management as companies both operate remotely and consider…
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Casella general counsel to hand over reins
David Schmitt to retire on December 31 after 14 years in the role David Schmitt, general counsel of Nasdaq-listed Casella Waste Systems for the past 14 years, plans to retire on December 31 this year. Shelley Sayward, who is currently vice president and assistant general counsel with the company, will take on the general counsel role from January 1, 2021. Schmitt has been senior vice president and general counsel since June 2012, having joined Casella in May 2006 as vice president and general counsel. Before that, he was president of his privately held consulting firm, and also served between 2002…
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McDonald’s general counsel retires
Mahrukh Hussain takes on role of interim general counsel and secretary McDonald’s Corporation corporate executive vice president, general counsel and secretary Jerome Krulewitch has retired from the company. McDonald’s says in an SEC filing that Krulewitch told the company on October 12 that he was stepping down, effective immediately. According to the filing, he has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and has been advised by doctors to leave his role. The company says a search is underway and that until Krulewitch’s successor is identified Mahrukh Hussain will take on the role of interim general counsel and secretary. Hussain was serving…
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Arch Resources promotes new general counsel from in-house
Robert Jones retiring from company NYSE-listed Arch Resources has appointed Rosemary Klein as senior vice president for law, general counsel and corporate secretary. Klein takes over the position from Robert Jones, who is retiring from the company as part of a long-standing succession plan. Jones has spent three decades with Arch and intends to remain with the company through a transition period, working on what the company calls a range of high-priority items. In her new role, Klein leads the company’s legal and compliance affairs globally. Before joining Arch in 2015, she worked as general counsel and corporate secretary, among…
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The week in GRC: Major asset owners pledge carbon cuts, and FCC to clarify social media companies’ protection
This week’s governance, compliance and risk-management stories from around the web – CNN reported that Alex Cruz was stepping down as chair and CEO of British Airways, which is owned by International Airlines Group (IAG). Sean Doyle, CEO of Irish airline Aer Lingus, which is also owned by IAG, will become British Airways CEO with immediate effect and will also take over from Cruz as chair after a transition period. Doyle worked at British Airways for two decades before moving to head Aer Lingus nearly two years ago. Donal Moriarty, the chief corporate affairs officer at Aer Lingus, will become…
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States adopt different approaches to workers’ compensation-coverage issues amid Covid-19
As workplaces reopen, employees, employers and state governments consider whether and how to apply workers’ compensation insurance to Covid-19 Workers’ compensation insurance was created at the beginning of the 20th century as a ‘grand bargain’ to provide guaranteed, no-fault benefits to employees who are injured, fall ill or die on the job in exchange for forfeiting their rights to sue their employer for additional sums. As workplaces reopen while the Covid-19 pandemic continues to infect individuals throughout the country, employees, employers and state governments are considering whether and how to apply workers’ compensation insurance to a widespread and difficult-to-trace virus.…