…Although federal law already requires corporations to disclose their political contributions, as well as any activity conducted by corporate political action committees, partisan activists want more, seeking to force the disclosure of expenditures for public policy and government affairs activities. Activists hope to use this information to publicly browbeat their opponents and eliminate their participation in public policy debates.
Having failed to get Congress to require these disclosures in 2010, activists are now targeting the SEC. One problem: The SEC lacks the authority to require disclosure of information that is not material.
This means that the information must be important to economic investment decision-making by a reasonable investor — not an investor with a narrow political bent or one who thinks it would be “nice to know” some relatively insignificant fact. Otherwise, disclosure of data is potentially limitless. For virtually every company, these public policy expenditures to defend the interests of their shareholders would be insignificant compared with revenue or expenses; if they were material, SEC rules already require disclosure…
