The AICPA professional ethics executive committee issues an exposure draft ( www.aicpa.org/members/div/ethics/ed020617.htm ) with revisions of five independence interpretations and/ or rulings. The proposed changes relate to trustee or executor relationships with clients, former practitioners and firm independence, relationships with entities included in government financial statements, auditors of insurance companies
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Today’s Business: Think Value, Not Dollars.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY OUTSOURCING IS REVOLUTIONIZING the way business is being conducted around the world, and that means CPAs will have to rethink how they establish the value of a business and the metrics they traditionally monitor. If they fail to do this, they will be left in a place
When the SEC Knocks….
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY WITH INCREASING NUMBERS OF CPAs OFFERING investment services, more are registering with the SEC as investment advisers and facing field examinations from the SEC Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations (OCIE). These investigations determine whether the adviser is complying with the Investment Advisers Act of 1940, protect
Golden Business Ideas
How to Spot Talented Workers Does top management know who the most capable workers are? At most businesses it’s the line managers who identify them. After all, as the conventional thinking goes, since the line managers supervise day-to-day staff performance, they should be the best judges. While that may be
Tax Notes
The IRS is performing better than it did in 1999, according to an independent review George Washington University and the magazine Government Executive conducted ( www.irs.gov/pub/irs-news/ir-02-62.pdf ). Contributing significantly to the service’s overall grade of B minus (up from C) was its information technology division, which improved its rating to
Castellano Presents Award
At the spring council meeting, AICPA Board Chairman James Castellano presented the Institute’s 2002 Public Service Award to Robert F. Fay, CPA, of Canton, Ohio, for his extensive volunteer work, which included building homes for low-income families and maintaining shelters for victims of domestic violence.
Block That Spreadsheet Error
t one time or another it happens to nearly every spreadsheet user: In an instant a perfectly good spreadsheet disintegrates right before your eyes, leaving a wasteland of #VALUE! error cells. What triggered the problem? Someone mistyped a value into one cell, causing the #VALUE! error message to be
Employee Benefits
The Department of Labor made final a rule ( www.dol.gov/pwba/regs/fedreg/final/2002008499.htm ) giving employee benefit plan administrators the option of using e-mail, the Internet and other computer-based systems for making, to participants and beneficiaries, disclosures required by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA). Under the provision, which takes
Revisiting Hedge Funds
“Freedom from Market Swings” ( JofA, May02, page 49) was both enjoyable and thought provoking. While reflecting upon the article, I formulated two distinct impressions of the information presented. First, it has been argued that recent valuations might not have been realistic or sustainable over the long run based, in
A Better Way to Make a Copied Excel Formula Constant
In the October 2001 “Technology Q&A,” we described how to use the dollar symbol ($) in Excel formulas to make formulas constant—so if you copy them to a different cell they won’t automatically change to reflect their new location. An easier way is to double-click on the cell to be
Wrap Excel Text with Just a Double-Click
Q. When I’m entering a long name in an Excel cell, I have to go through all the format steps to wrap the text in the cell and then I have to adjust each line so it wraps properly. It’s not a problem if I just have to adjust a
Financial Reporting
The SEC proposes rules requiring CEOs and CFOs of publicly traded companies to certify their organizations’ quarterly and annual reports are accurate, timely and contain all the information a “reasonable” investor would consider “significant” ( www.sec.gov/news/press/2002-88.htm ). The rules also would cut to two business days—from the current five to
Hazy Reporting
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY CONTRARY TO WHAT IS REQUIRED IN AUDITED financial statements, the only SEC regulation governing what companies put in their earnings releases is that the information should not be misleading. There are currently no substantive authoritative guidelines that determine when pro forma information is deceptive. BOTH CORPORATE CPAs
Auditing
The auditing standards board issues SAS no. 97, Amendment to Statement on Auditing Standards (SAS) no. 50, Reports on the Application of Accounting Principles. The new statement (see Official Releases, page 90), which is effective for written reports issued or oral advice provided on or after June 30, amends SAS
Smart Stops on the Web
MUTUAL FUND SITES Resources and Reading Materials www.mfea.com CPAs providing investment planning advice can find information about assessing risk tolerance, the benefits of mutual funds and emerging markets at the Mutual Fund Education Alliance Web site. Practitioners can have clients fill out a personality profile to pinpoint how aggressive, conservative
Institute Earns Laurels for Explaining Profession to Students
The AICPA’s “America’s CPAs Start Here, Go Places” recruitment program, begun in 2001, received two awards from the Professional Marketing Association Inc. ( www.pmalink.org/html/2002reggiewinners.html ). Known as Reggies, the awards recognized the Institute for excellence in creating an effective Web-based direct marketing campaign ( www.startheregoplaces.com ) in collaboration with several
Determining the Form of Doing Business in Canada
August 2002 > From The Tax Adviser Unexpected problems for companies operating as LLCs. From The Tax Adviser: Determining the Form of Doing Business in Canada ith its undervalued currency, stable economy and easy access, Canada appears to be the perfect place in which to start a
FYI
The Financial Accounting Standards Advisory Board issues Implementation Guide to the Statement of Financing in Statement of Federal Financial Accounting Standards No. 7, Accounting for Revenue and Other Financing Sources and Concepts for Reconciling Budgetary and Financial Accounting ( www.fasab.gov/pdf/ig7sof.pdf ). It illustrates concepts underlying the statement of financing, in
Privacy Framework Helps CPAs Protect Consumers
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY COMPANIES REQUIRE HELP understanding and complying with the confusing array of privacy rules, and CPAs can meet that need. HIGHLY PUBLICIZED CORPORATE FAILURES to protect confidential data have heightened consumers’ awareness of threats to their privacy. CONSUMERS SURVEYED SAID they would rather do business with companies that
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Promises of ‘fast and easy’ threaten SOC credibility
CPAs warn that an ongoing push for high-volume SOC services may come at the cost of quality and objectivity.
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Trust distributions in kind and the Sec. 643(e)(3) election
January 31, 2026
Effects of the OBBBA on higher education
December 31, 2025
