Mechanisms of Compliance With United States Citizenship Requirements for the Ownership of Vessels Eligible To Engage in Restricted Trades by Publicly Traded Companies, 70452-70453 [2012-28560]
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Federal Register / Vol. 77, No. 227 / Monday, November 26, 2012 / Notices
3–5, 2012. The purpose of the report is
to summarize the workshop and identify
future research priorities. The report
will be available online beginning
December 7, 2012, at https://prevention.
nih.gov/workshops/2012/pcos/
default.aspx.
Comments on the report will be
accepted from December 7, 2012, to
January 4, 2013.
ADDRESSES: Written comments must be
postmarked by January 4, 2013, and
should be sent to the NIH Office of
Disease Prevention, ATTN: Paris A.
Watson, 6100 Executive Boulevard,
Suite 2B03, Bethesda, Maryland 20892.
Email comments should be sent to
prevention@mail.nih.gov by January 4,
2013.
DATES:
To
request more information, please
contact Paris A. Watson at 301–496–
6615 or prevention@mail.nih.gov.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Polycystic
ovary syndrome (PCOS) is a common
hormone disorder that affects
approximately 5 million reproductiveaged women in the United States.
Women with PCOS have difficulty
becoming pregnant (i.e., are infertile)
due to hormone imbalances that cause
or result from altered development of
ovarian follicles. One such imbalance is
high blood levels of androgens, which
can come from both the ovaries and
adrenal gland. Other organ systems that
are affected by PCOS include the
pancreas, liver, muscle, blood
vasculature, and fat.
In addition to fertility impairment,
other common symptoms of PCOS
include:
• Irregular or no menstrual periods
(for women of reproductive age)
• Acne
• Weight gain
• Excess hair growth on the face and
body
• Thinning scalp hair
• Ovarian cysts.
Women with PCOS are often resistant
to the biological effects of insulin and,
as a consequence, may have high
insulin levels. As such, women with
PCOS are at risk for type 2 diabetes,
high cholesterol, and high blood
pressure. Obesity also appears to worsen
the condition. Costs to the U.S. health
care system to identify and manage
PCOS are approximately $4 billion
annually; however, this estimate does
not include treatment of the serious
conditions associated with PCOS.
For most of the 20th century, PCOS
was a poorly understood condition. In
1990, the NIH held a conference on
PCOS to create both a working
mstockstill on DSK4VPTVN1PROD with NOTICES
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:
VerDate Mar<15>2010
16:24 Nov 23, 2012
Jkt 229001
definition of the disorder and diagnostic
criteria. The outcome of this conference,
the NIH Criteria, served as a standard
for researchers and clinicians for more
than a decade. In 2003, a consensus
workshop in Rotterdam developed new
diagnostic criteria, the Rotterdam
Criteria. The 2012 NIH Evidence-Based
Methodology Workshop on PCOS seeks
to clarify:
• The benefits and drawbacks of
using the Rotterdam Criteria;
• The condition’s causes, predictors,
and long-term consequences;
• The optimal prevention and
treatment strategies.
The NIH workshop is sponsored by
the Office of Disease Prevention and the
Eunice Kennedy Shriver National
Institute of Child Health and Human
Development. A multidisciplinary
steering committee developed the
workshop agenda. The NIH Library
created an extensive, descriptive
bibliography on PCOS to facilitate
workshop discussion. During the twoand-one-half-day workshop, invited
experts will discuss the body of
evidence and attendees will have
opportunities to provide comments
during open discussion periods. After
weighing the evidence, an unbiased,
independent panel will prepare a report
that summarizes the workshop and
identifies future research priorities.
The report will be available online
beginning December 7, 2012, at https://
prevention.nih.gov/workshops/2012/
pcos/default.aspx.
Dated: November 16, 2012.
Francis S. Collins,
Director, National Institutes of Health.
[FR Doc. 2012–28608 Filed 11–23–12; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4140–01–P
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND
SECURITY
Coast Guard
[Docket No. USCG–2011–0619]
Mechanisms of Compliance With
United States Citizenship
Requirements for the Ownership of
Vessels Eligible To Engage in
Restricted Trades by Publicly Traded
Companies
Coast Guard, DHS.
Notice; response to comments.
AGENCY:
ACTION:
As part of its January 2011
report on a Coast Guard investigation
into the citizenship of owners of a
publicly traded company, the National
Vessel Documentation Center
recommended requesting comments and
SUMMARY:
PO 00000
Frm 00041
Fmt 4703
Sfmt 4703
information on the various measures
that publicly traded companies employ
to comply with the statutory
requirement that at least 75 percent of
the ownership of companies that
operate vessels engaged in the coastwise
trade be vested in U.S. citizens. On
November 3, 2011, the Coast Guard
published a notice in the Federal
Register seeking those comments and
that information. The Coast Guard read
the written submissions and listened to
oral comments generated by that notice
and issues today’s notice to inform
industry and the public on how the
Coast Guard plans to exercise its
discretion in enforcing the referenced
U.S. citizen ownership requirement.
ADDRESSES: Comments and material
received from the public, as well as
documents mentioned in this notice as
being available in the docket, are part of
docket USCG–2011–0619 and are
available for inspection or copying at
the Docket Management Facility (M–30),
U.S. Department of Transportation,
West Building Ground Floor, Room
W12–140, 1200 New Jersey Avenue SE.,
Washington, DC 20590, between 9 a.m.
and 5 p.m., Monday through Friday,
except Federal holidays. You may also
find this docket on the Internet by going
to https://www.regulations.gov, inserting
USCG–2011–0619 in the ‘‘Search’’ box,
and then clicking ‘‘Search.’’
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: If
you have questions on this notice, call
or email Mr. Douglas Cameron, United
States Coast Guard, National Vessel
Documentation Center; telephone 304–
271–2506, email Douglas.G.Cameron@
uscg.mil. If you have questions on
viewing the docket, call Renee V.
Wright, Program Manager, Docket
Operations, telephone 202–366–9826.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: On
November 3, 2011, the Coast Guard
published a notice in the Federal
Register (76 FR 68203) (‘‘2011 notice’’)
requesting comments and information
on the various measures that publicly
traded companies employ in order to
comply with the requirement in 46
U.S.C. 50501 that at least 75 percent of
the ownership of companies that
operate vessels engaged in the coastwise
trade be vested in U.S. citizens. The
2011 notice was published because of a
recommendation in a January 12, 2011,
Coast Guard report of an investigation
into the citizenship of Trico Marine
Services, Inc. (‘‘Trico Report’’). A copy
of this report has been placed in the
docket and is also available via https://
www.uscg.mil/hq/cg5/nvdc/ (under the
Latest News tab). The Coast Guard
solicited the following information in
the 2011 notice (emphasis added):
E:\FR\FM\26NON1.SGM
26NON1
Federal Register / Vol. 77, No. 227 / Monday, November 26, 2012 / Notices
This notice solicits information, for the
benefit of the Coast Guard but also for the
mutual benefit of industry, as to the
mechanisms that publicly traded companies
have employed, including but not limited to
those mentioned in the quoted language
above, to assure compliance with United
States citizenship requirements. We are also
requesting information on the manner in
which those mechanisms function to provide
that assurance and, when called upon to do
so, to offer proof of compliance. 76 FR 68205.
The reference to ‘‘the quoted language
above’’ was to language in the most
recent Coast Guard statement published
in the Federal Register which addressed
this subject. See 58 FR 60256, November
15, 1993 (‘‘1993 final rule’’). At that
time, the Coast Guard offered the
following statement which referenced
only two mechanisms as examples
(emphasis added):
mstockstill on DSK4VPTVN1PROD with NOTICES
The documentation laws are meant to be
restrictive and are intended to limit the
persons who are eligible to document vessels
under U.S. law and acquire trading
privileges. Corporations can make proof of
citizenship less difficult, for instance by
restricting sale of their stock to U.S. citizens,
or using a transfer agent to administer a dual
stock certificate system. Of course, any U.S.
corporation that is unwilling to subject itself
to the possibility of having to prove that it
qualifies for coastwise or fisheries privileges
can choose not to seek them. The Coast
Guard will not be bound by any
presumptions or inferences in making
eligibility determinations for documentation
purposes. 58 FR 60258–59.
Comments in Response to 2011 Notice
The comments the Coast Guard
received from industry in response to
the 2011 notice detailed how companies
monitor and determine compliance with
the statutory standard in the current
paperless securities trading market,
which is regulated by the Securities and
Exchange Commission (‘‘SEC’’) and
more complex than the system that
existed when the Coast Guard issued its
1993 final rule. Those comments
indicated that publicly-traded
companies employ several measures to
monitor and determine compliance,
sometimes in combination with one
another. These include, among others:
• Use of the Depository Trust
Company segregated account (or ‘‘SEG–
100’’) system;
• Monitoring SEC filings re: 5%
holders (Schedules 13D, 13G, Form 13F)
and follow-up requests for information
from filers;
• Use of protective provisions in
organizational documents in order to
guard against and rectify the possibility
of what are referred to as excess shares;
• Communications with NonObjecting Beneficial Owners (or
‘‘NOBOs’’);
VerDate Mar<15>2010
16:24 Nov 23, 2012
Jkt 229001
• Analysis of registered stockholders;
and
• Use of dual stock certificates.
We also considered comments made
at a general discussion of these issues at
a forum organized by the Chamber of
Shipping of America held on September
13, 2012, in Washington, DC, the
minutes of which have been placed in
the online docket (USCG–2011–0619 via
www.regulations.gov).
The Coast Guard has taken all of the
comments offered into account and is
grateful to the commenters who were
thorough, candid and forthcoming in
their responses to the 2011 notice, both
in the written responses and the
discussion engaged in at the forum
referred to above. The responses
received and information provided are
exactly what had been hoped for by
publication of the notice and affirmed
our sense, following issuance of the
Trico Report, that it was appropriate, in
light of the significant technological
changes that have occurred in the
trading of shares of stock since the Coast
Guard’s 1993 final rule, to take another
look at the issue.
The Coast Guard recognizes that in
the modern, complex, multi-faceted,
and dynamic securities market no single
measure or combination of measures
may always provide direct proof of the
citizenship of every shareholder. The
Coast Guard also recognizes that the
choice of compliance measures is best
left up to the individual company as
each one is best positioned to evaluate
initially and on an on-going basis the
totality of its circumstances.
Companies that employ, and
diligently administer and adhere to,
measures such as those identified above
in an active system of monitoring stock
ownership may use these as a sufficient
basis to file an Application for Initial
Issue, Exchange, or Replacement of
Certificate of Documentation (form CG–
1258) to document a vessel with a
coastwise endorsement. In that regard,
while the Coast Guard expects diligence
and good faith efforts, it will be realistic
about acceptable measures in the
current trading environment. Finally,
the Coast Guard acknowledges that it
does not seek to unnecessarily restrict
access to the legitimate capital markets,
which it recognizes to be essential to the
maintenance of a strong and vibrant
coastwise shipping industry, nor to
mandate a one-size-fits-all structure or
mechanism to ensure compliance with
U.S. citizenship requirements. The
Coast Guard, however, must fulfill its
obligation to ensure compliance with
those requirements, and will look for
due diligence and timely good faith
action by every company that seeks to
PO 00000
Frm 00042
Fmt 4703
Sfmt 4703
70453
participate in restricted trading
privileges, using means that are
available to the company and at its
disposal, in order to satisfy U.S.
citizenship requirements.
The Coast Guard has a long-standing
policy that the filing of a properly
completed CG–1258 establishes a
rebuttable presumption that the
applicant is a United States citizen. See
46 CFR 67.43. The presumption can be
rebutted with evidence that the
statutory requirements have not been
met. Such evidence can provide the
basis for the Coast Guard to initiate an
investigation and the burden will be
upon the vessel owner to establish
compliance. In investigations of
publicly-traded companies for
compliance with the statutory
citizenship requirements, the Coast
Guard will give positive consideration
to a company’s diligent and good faith
efforts to timely and effectively monitor
the ownership of its stock and take
prompt action where necessary so as to
maintain compliance with the statutory
requirements.
Further Development of Enforcement
Policy
The Coast Guard will continue to
listen to industry and the public and
monitor events concerning this issue.
We anticipate refining our enforcement
policy as we see how well our stated
policy works in allowing the Coast
Guard to meet its obligation to ensure
that at least 75 percent of the ownership
of companies that operate vessels
engaged in the coastwise trade are
vested in U.S. citizens. If we see the
need for any new enforcement policy,
we would invite comments on any such
policy through a separate notice. We
appreciate all the comments made in
response to the 2011 notice.
This notice is issued under authority
of 5 U.S.C. 552(a).
Dated: November 14, 2012.
Timothy V. Skuby,
Director, National Vessel Documentation
Center, U.S. Coast Guard.
[FR Doc. 2012–28560 Filed 11–23–12; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 9110–04–P
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND
SECURITY
Coast Guard
[Docket No. USCG–2012–1030]
Chemical Transportation Advisory
Committee
AGENCY:
E:\FR\FM\26NON1.SGM
Coast Guard, DHS.
26NON1
]]>Agencies
[Federal Register Volume 77, Number 227 (Monday, November 26, 2012)]
[Notices]
[Pages 70452-70453]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2012-28560]
=======================================================================
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
Coast Guard
[Docket No. USCG-2011-0619]
Mechanisms of Compliance With United States Citizenship
Requirements for the Ownership of Vessels Eligible To Engage in
Restricted Trades by Publicly Traded Companies
AGENCY: Coast Guard, DHS.
ACTION: Notice; response to comments.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
SUMMARY: As part of its January 2011 report on a Coast Guard
investigation into the citizenship of owners of a publicly traded
company, the National Vessel Documentation Center recommended
requesting comments and information on the various measures that
publicly traded companies employ to comply with the statutory
requirement that at least 75 percent of the ownership of companies that
operate vessels engaged in the coastwise trade be vested in U.S.
citizens. On November 3, 2011, the Coast Guard published a notice in
the Federal Register seeking those comments and that information. The
Coast Guard read the written submissions and listened to oral comments
generated by that notice and issues today's notice to inform industry
and the public on how the Coast Guard plans to exercise its discretion
in enforcing the referenced U.S. citizen ownership requirement.
ADDRESSES: Comments and material received from the public, as well as
documents mentioned in this notice as being available in the docket,
are part of docket USCG-2011-0619 and are available for inspection or
copying at the Docket Management Facility (M-30), U.S. Department of
Transportation, West Building Ground Floor, Room W12-140, 1200 New
Jersey Avenue SE., Washington, DC 20590, between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m.,
Monday through Friday, except Federal holidays. You may also find this
docket on the Internet by going to https://www.regulations.gov,
inserting USCG-2011-0619 in the ``Search'' box, and then clicking
``Search.''
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: If you have questions on this notice,
call or email Mr. Douglas Cameron, United States Coast Guard, National
Vessel Documentation Center; telephone 304-271-2506, email
Douglas.G.Cameron@uscg.mil. If you have questions on viewing the
docket, call Renee V. Wright, Program Manager, Docket Operations,
telephone 202-366-9826.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: On November 3, 2011, the Coast Guard
published a notice in the Federal Register (76 FR 68203) (``2011
notice'') requesting comments and information on the various measures
that publicly traded companies employ in order to comply with the
requirement in 46 U.S.C. 50501 that at least 75 percent of the
ownership of companies that operate vessels engaged in the coastwise
trade be vested in U.S. citizens. The 2011 notice was published because
of a recommendation in a January 12, 2011, Coast Guard report of an
investigation into the citizenship of Trico Marine Services, Inc.
(``Trico Report''). A copy of this report has been placed in the docket
and is also available via https://www.uscg.mil/hq/cg5/nvdc/ (under the
Latest News tab). The Coast Guard solicited the following information
in the 2011 notice (emphasis added):
[[Page 70453]]
This notice solicits information, for the benefit of the Coast
Guard but also for the mutual benefit of industry, as to the
mechanisms that publicly traded companies have employed, including
but not limited to those mentioned in the quoted language above, to
assure compliance with United States citizenship requirements. We
are also requesting information on the manner in which those
mechanisms function to provide that assurance and, when called upon
to do so, to offer proof of compliance. 76 FR 68205.
The reference to ``the quoted language above'' was to language in
the most recent Coast Guard statement published in the Federal Register
which addressed this subject. See 58 FR 60256, November 15, 1993
(``1993 final rule''). At that time, the Coast Guard offered the
following statement which referenced only two mechanisms as examples
(emphasis added):
The documentation laws are meant to be restrictive and are
intended to limit the persons who are eligible to document vessels
under U.S. law and acquire trading privileges. Corporations can make
proof of citizenship less difficult, for instance by restricting
sale of their stock to U.S. citizens, or using a transfer agent to
administer a dual stock certificate system. Of course, any U.S.
corporation that is unwilling to subject itself to the possibility
of having to prove that it qualifies for coastwise or fisheries
privileges can choose not to seek them. The Coast Guard will not be
bound by any presumptions or inferences in making eligibility
determinations for documentation purposes. 58 FR 60258-59.
Comments in Response to 2011 Notice
The comments the Coast Guard received from industry in response to
the 2011 notice detailed how companies monitor and determine compliance
with the statutory standard in the current paperless securities trading
market, which is regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission
(``SEC'') and more complex than the system that existed when the Coast
Guard issued its 1993 final rule. Those comments indicated that
publicly-traded companies employ several measures to monitor and
determine compliance, sometimes in combination with one another. These
include, among others:
Use of the Depository Trust Company segregated account (or
``SEG-100'') system;
Monitoring SEC filings re: 5% holders (Schedules 13D, 13G,
Form 13F) and follow-up requests for information from filers;
Use of protective provisions in organizational documents
in order to guard against and rectify the possibility of what are
referred to as excess shares;
Communications with Non-Objecting Beneficial Owners (or
``NOBOs'');
Analysis of registered stockholders; and
Use of dual stock certificates.
We also considered comments made at a general discussion of these
issues at a forum organized by the Chamber of Shipping of America held
on September 13, 2012, in Washington, DC, the minutes of which have
been placed in the online docket (USCG-2011-0619 via
www.regulations.gov).
The Coast Guard has taken all of the comments offered into account
and is grateful to the commenters who were thorough, candid and
forthcoming in their responses to the 2011 notice, both in the written
responses and the discussion engaged in at the forum referred to above.
The responses received and information provided are exactly what had
been hoped for by publication of the notice and affirmed our sense,
following issuance of the Trico Report, that it was appropriate, in
light of the significant technological changes that have occurred in
the trading of shares of stock since the Coast Guard's 1993 final rule,
to take another look at the issue.
The Coast Guard recognizes that in the modern, complex, multi-
faceted, and dynamic securities market no single measure or combination
of measures may always provide direct proof of the citizenship of every
shareholder. The Coast Guard also recognizes that the choice of
compliance measures is best left up to the individual company as each
one is best positioned to evaluate initially and on an on-going basis
the totality of its circumstances.
Companies that employ, and diligently administer and adhere to,
measures such as those identified above in an active system of
monitoring stock ownership may use these as a sufficient basis to file
an Application for Initial Issue, Exchange, or Replacement of
Certificate of Documentation (form CG-1258) to document a vessel with a
coastwise endorsement. In that regard, while the Coast Guard expects
diligence and good faith efforts, it will be realistic about acceptable
measures in the current trading environment. Finally, the Coast Guard
acknowledges that it does not seek to unnecessarily restrict access to
the legitimate capital markets, which it recognizes to be essential to
the maintenance of a strong and vibrant coastwise shipping industry,
nor to mandate a one-size-fits-all structure or mechanism to ensure
compliance with U.S. citizenship requirements. The Coast Guard,
however, must fulfill its obligation to ensure compliance with those
requirements, and will look for due diligence and timely good faith
action by every company that seeks to participate in restricted trading
privileges, using means that are available to the company and at its
disposal, in order to satisfy U.S. citizenship requirements.
The Coast Guard has a long-standing policy that the filing of a
properly completed CG-1258 establishes a rebuttable presumption that
the applicant is a United States citizen. See 46 CFR 67.43. The
presumption can be rebutted with evidence that the statutory
requirements have not been met. Such evidence can provide the basis for
the Coast Guard to initiate an investigation and the burden will be
upon the vessel owner to establish compliance. In investigations of
publicly-traded companies for compliance with the statutory citizenship
requirements, the Coast Guard will give positive consideration to a
company's diligent and good faith efforts to timely and effectively
monitor the ownership of its stock and take prompt action where
necessary so as to maintain compliance with the statutory requirements.
Further Development of Enforcement Policy
The Coast Guard will continue to listen to industry and the public
and monitor events concerning this issue. We anticipate refining our
enforcement policy as we see how well our stated policy works in
allowing the Coast Guard to meet its obligation to ensure that at least
75 percent of the ownership of companies that operate vessels engaged
in the coastwise trade are vested in U.S. citizens. If we see the need
for any new enforcement policy, we would invite comments on any such
policy through a separate notice. We appreciate all the comments made
in response to the 2011 notice.
This notice is issued under authority of 5 U.S.C. 552(a).
Dated: November 14, 2012.
Timothy V. Skuby,
Director, National Vessel Documentation Center, U.S. Coast Guard.
[FR Doc. 2012-28560 Filed 11-23-12; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 9110-04-P
