The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has proposed to increase fines and penalties for the late and non-filing of certain annual reports to improve compliance with reportorial requirements.
The corporate watchdog has released the draft guidelines for public comment on the updated scale of fines for the late and non-submission of audited financial statements (AFS) and general information sheet (GIS), as well as non-compliance with SEC memorandum circular No. 28.
The proposed adjusted rates will raise the penalty by 20 percent from the base penalty per offense, and will be imposed on a per report and per year basis.
The scale of penalties would be based on the retained earnings for domestic stock corporations, fund balance for domestic non-stock corporations, and accumulated income for foreign stock corporations, including branches, representative offices, and regional headquarters, as well as foreign non-stock corporations.
The proposed guidelines also state that a corporation may be declared under delinquent status or have its registration revoked for repeated offenses or failure to comply with reportorial requirements.