April 2009 - Journal of Accountancy

Retirement, health issues for an owner, the desire to grow—all of these are reasons firms engage in mergers or acquisitions. Most firms decide to merge or acquire only after considerable analysis of financial and professional outcomes. Last month we gave general advice for ensuring a merger or acquisition goes smoothly.

Company controller Plony, CPA, prepared his employer’s 2007 financial statements knowing that they misstated revenues. The company’s CEO, who could fire Plony at will, “strongly urged” Plony to record sales at full invoice prices despite customers’ rights to return merchandise long after a normal return period. Plony’s brother-in-law, a company

The IRS has acknowledged there’s plenty of pain to go around in the current economic downturn. Financially strapped taxpayers can take advantage of several relief initiatives and provisions that could lessen their tax bite. Those with investments posting a loss may be able to “harvest” it or at least reposition

An economic downturn like the current one can cause fixed lease obligations to become burdensome and trigger a significant negative impact on leasing in many markets. Real property and other business assets may have been leased in a sale-leaseback transaction, or the lessee may have simply desired use but not

With the enactment of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 on Feb. 17, Congress delivered a smorgasbord of tax relief items to individual taxpayers and small businesses. While the specifics of those measures were the subject of whirlwind conference negotiations in Congress, the outcome reflects an attempt to

Talk about pressure—and not just in tax season. Keeping office computer systems up and running in small and medium CPA firms is an enormous and unending responsibility. Without reliable computing and communication capabilities, your staff, your clients and your business are dead in the water. To mitigate the risk of

If you think IFRS is difficult for CPAs to comprehend, talk to non-CPAs. Historically, accounting professionals have insulated their colleagues from understanding the effort involved in implementing newly issued accounting standards. As a result, you cannot expect them to understand the challenge associated with adopting an entirely new framework. To

As part of the convergence effort between IFRS and U.S. GAAP, the International Accounting Standards Board published IFRS 8, Operating Segments, which became effective Jan 1. IFRS 8 supersedes IAS 14, Segment Reporting, and closely resembles the “through the eyes of management” approach of FASB Statement no. 131, Disclosures about