Brian Breheny, Raquel Fox and Joseph Yaffe are Partners at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP. This post is based on their Skadden memorandum.
Assess the Impact of SEC Staff Comments
The staff of the Disclosure Review Program (DRP) in the SEC’s Division of Corporation Finance has remained quite active. During the 12-month period ended June 30, 2022, the staff issued approximately 10% more comment letters on company filings compared to the prior year period. [1] This uptick in comment letters reversed the downward trend of recent years. In addition to the general areas of focus of staff comments (discussed below), the staff launched new initiatives focused on disclosures related to climate change and corporate governance. [2]
The Division of Corporation Finance also announced the addition of two new review offices to the DRP — the Office of Crypto Assets and the Office of Industrial Applications and Services. [3] The Office of Crypto Assets will continue the work currently performed across the DRP to review filings involving cryptoassets. The Office of Industrial Applications and Services will oversee filings currently assigned to the Office of Life Sciences for companies that are not pharma, biotech or medicinal products companies. The addition of these two new offices reflects the recent growth in the cryptoasset and the life sciences industries.
