In the last of our four-part Beyond the Balance Sheet series, we review one consultant's scorecard on how big corporations act as citizens.
In a landmark decision, the Federal Court has found that executives and directors of troubled property group Centro breached the Corporations Act by signing off on financial reports that failed to disclose billions of dollars of short-term debt.
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One of its contributors, Tim Worstall, recently took me to task for suggesting that a way for citizens to gain some countervailing power over large global corporations is for governments to threaten denial of market access unless corporations act responsibly.
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Barrick Gold Corporation is a Corporation governed by the Business Corporations Act (Ontario) resulting from the amalgamation, effective July 14, 1984, under the laws of the Province of Ontario, of Camflo Mines Limited, Bob-Clare Investments Limited and the former Barrick Resources Corporation.
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In a curious parallel development, effective middle managers within large corporations increasingly act like angel investors internally.
In that regard, corporations must act fast or have pre-existing agreements in place in order to secure March Madness advertising opportunities.
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Now Prime Minister Abe is trying to force corporations to act.
While such data has been a benchmark for European-based companies for some time, we are now seeing a more global adoption and interest in this, which should be another forcing function for more corporations to act as good corporate citizens.
If governments adopt or implement the right economic incentives when making laws for example, a person who works harder, longer, smarter or more efficiently can benefit financially from doing so the public needs very little policing because most people and corporations will act appropriately.
These corporations came to expect government to act on their behalf abroad, even to the extreme of overthrowing uncooperative foreign leaders.
Even foreign corporations may now get into the act.
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Even big corporations like Pepsi are getting into the act with their Pepsi Cam and Jeff Gordon test drive.
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Shell, which denies any wrongdoing, now argues that the Alien Tort Act should not apply to corporations, even American ones, and furthermore should not cover violations committed outside American jurisdiction.
Additionally, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) mandates corporations set up procedures for whistle-blowers to provide information, specifically through an anonymous reporting channel, without retaliation from superiors.
The US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act makes it a crime for US corporations and their subsidiaries to bribe foreign officials, and some other large US companies have found themselves on the wrong side of the law.
In a strong political statement from the private sector, more than 80 CEOs from major U.S. corporations penned a release urging Congress to get its act together and find a bipartisan solution to the coming fiscal cliff.
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Opponents of the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act have been busy building tools to identify which corporations have lobbied for the bill to better boycott their products.
The following year the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1987 would create requirements that forced most S corporations and professional service corporation on to a December year end.
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In the last decade, main stream corporations like Walmart, General Electric and Waste Management got into the act with eco-innovations to better meet customer and investor expectations.
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The U.S. government has in recent years, for example, induced corporations to conduct highly expensive internal investigation to comply with the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
This provision of the Dodd-Frank Act, effective next year, will have the effect of forcing public corporations to open kimonos they have long cinched tight--even companies with relatively transparent disclosure practices.
U.S. lawmakers designed the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) to "force foreign financial institutions, foreign trusts, and foreign corporations to provide information" on undisclosed assets held by Americans after Dec. 31, 2012.
It never ceases to amaze me that 25 years after the Tax Reform Act of 1986, there is still a significant amount of appreciated property inside closely held C corporations.
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Are the Republican Presidential candidates genuinely concerned about small businesses or are they focused on big corporations who would undoubtedly benefit from a lower corporate tax rate and a repeal of the Dodd-Frank Act?
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Now the Court will be tackling the question of whether corporations have the right of private citizens when it comes to privacy protection for individuals under the Freedom of Information Act.
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