On February 24th, the SEC updated its Public Alert: Unregistered Soliciting Entities (PAUSE) list, which contains entities that have been subject of investor complaints. This list of entities falsely claim to be registered, licensed, and/or located in the United States, impersonate genuine registered securities firms, and claim to be fictitious regulators, government agencies, or organizations. The goal of the PAUSE list is to better inform investors so that they can avoid becoming the victim of fraud.

The SEC Office of Structured Disclosure has announced that the 2012 and 2013 INVEST taxonomies will no longer be supported by EDGAR as of the EDGAR release currently scheduled for March 9, 2020. These taxonomies were intended for use in the voluntary filing program. The voluntary filing program has ended, so support for these taxonomies will be removed.

On January 30th, the SEC proposed amendments to modernize, simplify, and enhance particular financial disclosure requirements in Regulation S-K. These amendments would eliminate duplicative disclosures and update and enhance Management’s Discussion and Analysis (MD&A) information, which would benefit investors while simplifying compliance efforts for companies. In addition, the SEC announced it is providing guidance on key performance indicators and metrics in MD&A disclosures.

Five federal agencies voted on January 30th to invite public comment on a proposal that would modify regulations that govern the implementation of the Volcker rule’s general prohibition on banking entities investing in or sponsoring hedge funds or private equity funds (known as “covered funds”). Since the regulations implementing the Volcker rule were finalized in 2013, the rule has created some compliance uncertainty and also imposed limits on certain banking services and activities that the rule was not intended to restrict.