106. FOREIGN PUBLIC ACCOUNTING FIRMS.
(a)APPLICABILITY TO CERTAIN FOREIGN FIRMS.—
(1)IN GENERAL.—Any foreign public accounting firm that prepares or furnishes an audit report with respect to any issuer, shall be subject to this Act and the rules of the Board and the Commission issued under this Act, in the same manner and to the same extent as a public accounting firm that is organized and operates under the laws of the United States or any State, except that registration pursuant to section 102 shall not by itself provide a basis for subjecting such a foreign public accounting firm to the jurisdiction of the Federal or State courts, other than with respect to controversies between such firms and the Board.
(2)BOARD AUTHORITY.—The Board may, by rule, determine that a foreign public accounting firm (or a class of such firms) that does not issue audit reports nonetheless plays such a substantial role in the preparation and furnishing of such reports for particular issuers, that it is necessary or appropriate, in light of the purposes of this Act and in the public interest or for the protection of investors, that such firm (or class of firms) should be treated as a public accounting firm
(b)PRODUCTION OF AUDIT WORKPAPERS.—
(1)CONSENT BY FOREIGN FIRMS.—If a foreign public
accounting firm issues an opinion or otherwise performs material services upon which a registered public accounting firm relies in issuing all or part of any audit report or any opinion contained in an audit report, that foreign public accounting firm shall be deemed to have consented—
(A) to produce its audit work papers for the Board
or the Commission in connection with any investigation
by either body with respect to that audit report; and
(B)to be subject to the jurisdiction of the courts of the United States for purposes of enforcement of any request for production of such work papers.
(2)CONSENT BY DOMESTIC FIRMS.—A registered public
accounting firm that relies upon the opinion of a foreign public accounting firm, as described in paragraph (1), shall be deemed—
(A)to have consented to supplying the audit work papers of that foreign public accounting firm in response to a request for production by the Board or the Commission