Washington, D.C., Of Counsel Michael Oxley, former Congressman and co-author of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX), appeared on the April 17, 2009, edition of CNBC's "Squawk on the Street" program discussing the future of financial regulation in America.
Asked if he believed another "Sarbanes-Oxley-like" act would result from the current financial crisis, Oxley said, "Obviously they'll be legislation [in] the regulatory vein. It's somewhat difficult to predict, but I expect that because of the public outrage of what's gone on, which is exactly the same as with Enron and WorldCom, you're going to see Congress and the regulators respond in a positive way. Hopefully, in a way that would provide for more transparency. I've always advocated the idea of having more transparency in these markets and let the investors make these kinds of decisions given good information—as opposed to an overly burdensome regulatory structure."
Asked to comment on how difficult it would be to regulate derivatives—which some see as a very basic, first step to take toward regulatory reform—Oxley said, "It's not easy to do and that's part of the problem going forward . . . to [make] a 'clearing house' . . . more available, the structures are already there . . . hopefully Congress will move in that direction. It's really difficult from a regulatory standpoint, not only because of the number of derivatives and the complications of those, but also because of the global aspect to those derivatives as well. We have to understand we are in a global economy."