Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Christopher Cox has made no secret of his desire to increase the use of technology that would aid in the effort towards more efficient corporate transparency, without the need for additional government regulation. Cox’s initiatives, The Wall Street Journal reports, include offering incentives to companies that tag pieces of financial information in a way that would make it easier for investors to compare one company with another, and introducing a new benchmark presenting mutual fund performance after taxes and fees are accounted for.
The WSJ compares this to miles-per-gallon figures for automobiles issued by the Environmental Protection Agency by allowing electronic versions of proxy statements in place of paper versions.