SEC Proposes New Share Repurchase Disclosure Rules

The Securities and Exchange Commission today proposed amendments to its rules regarding disclosure about an issuer’s repurchases of its equity securities, often referred to as buybacks. "Share buybacks have become a significant component of how public issuers return capital to shareholders," said SEC Chair Gary Gensler. "I think we can lessen the information asymmetries between issuers and investors through enhanced timeliness and granularity of disclosures that today’s proposal would provide." The proposed rules would require an issuer to provide a new Form SR before the end of the first business day following the day the issuer executes a share repurchase.