Congress Disapproves the SEC’s Resource Extraction Rule
The U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate recently passed a joint resolution disapproving the “resource extraction rule” of the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”). The final rule, adopted by the SEC on June 27, 2016, implemented the Dodd-Frank requirement that issuers that engage in the commercial development of oil, natural gas, or minerals (“resource extraction issuers”) disclose annually payments made to the U.S. federal government or any foreign government for the purpose of the commercial development of oil, natural gas, or minerals by such resource extraction issuers, their subsidiaries and other entities under their control. Under the final rule, resource extraction issuers would have been required to comply with the rule commencing with their fiscal year ending on or after September 30, 2018.