When the SPAC boom took off, you could almost see the dollar signs in executives’ eyes—a huge payment after a fixed period of time, the chance to delve into the world of public money, and the entrance into the market at a high. While some didn’t see the payday, they enhanced their market attraction.

To review, a SPAC—or special purpose acquisition company (also known as a blank-check firm)—with a limited life span of two years, created to raise funding via an initial public offering, so it can merge with or acquire an already-existing company, kind of an end around to the traditional IPO.

They’re not a new economic entity, but became extremely popular between 2020 and mid-2022: According to the Harvard Business Review, in 2020, more than 50% of new public companies in the US were SPACs.

For those once-hopeful SPACs, the market started to trend downward late last year. And not all SPACs had managed to deSPAC (say that five times fast) before the crash. “By the end of 2022, approximately 350 SPACs (with $96 billion in raised proceeds) faced a 2023 deadline to acquire a target,” according to a January analysis by Boston Consulting Group.

DeSPAC-ing, or reverse-merging, comes with a big payout for executives in the company. However, if they don’t do so in time, they have to pay back investors, with interest, on the loan given at the time of IPO.

“There were so many private equity deals done in 2021, and the latter half of 2021. [There] were so many SPACs,” Jim Lawson, co-leader of the Russell Reynolds Global Financial Officers practice, told CFO Brew. “A lot of those companies, the economics just aren’t where they thought they would be right now—not to say that that’s not going to work itself out.”

And even though their pockets may not be filled to the brim with realized stock gains, these executives are now able to enter an employment market with a great need for ripe CFO talent, Lawson said. Continue reading here.—KT

The SEC has fined a South Carolina tech company $3 million for making “misleading disclosures” about a 2020 ransomware attack.

When Blackbaud announced in July 2020 that it had suffered a ransomware attack, the public company, which offers donor management software to nonprofits, said that it had paid a ransom, and that the breach did not include users’ sensitive financial data, according to the SEC.

However, several days after the announcement, the SEC said, some Blackbaud staff discovered that the attacker had “accessed and exfiltrated” sensitive information, including donor bank account information and Social Security numbers, affecting more than 13,000 accounts but did not tell senior management in charge of public disclosures “because the company failed to maintain disclosure controls and procedures.”

As a result, the company then failed to include “this material information about the scope of the attack and misleadingly characterized the risk of an attacker obtaining such sensitive donor information as hypothetical,” in its August 2020 quarterly report, according to the SEC.

“Blackbaud failed to disclose the full impact of a ransomware attack despite its personnel learning that its earlier public statements about the attack were erroneous,” said David Hirsch, chief of the SEC Enforcement Division’s Crypto Assets and Cyber Unit, in a press release. “Public companies have an obligation to provide their investors with accurate and timely material information; Blackbaud failed to do so.”

Blackbaud has not admitted or denied the SEC’s findings, but agreed to pay the $3 million fine and “cease and desist from committing violations” of the same kind.

Public companies will most likely have to prioritize cybersecurity even further in new ways soon. Blackbaud’s fine comes amid an SEC push for public companies to ramp up their cybersecurity preparedness and disclosure efforts. New cybersecurity disclosure rules are expected to be finalized next month.—DA

Stat: ~$53.7 billion. That’s the amount that the Swiss National Bank offered to Credit Suisse to “pre-emptively strengthen its liquidity,” as investors remain wary about the health of the banking sector. (the Wall Street Journal)

Quote: “As I have said consistently over many years now, it is for governments to make policy and enact legislation, and not for companies, including asset managers, to be the environmental police.”—Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock Investments, in his annual letter to investors. (CNBC)

Read: The company culture of Silicon Valley Bank was a lot like the startups that made up the majority of its customer base, “not cutthroat” like other Wall Street firms, according to one former executive. (Financial Times)

Risky biz: On March 30, CFO Brew chats with Audible’s chief financial and growth officer about the balancing act of measured risk vs. timely opportunity. Save your virtual seat. Sponsored by Oracle NetSuite.*

^{*This is sponsored advertising content.}