January 2012 - Journal of Accountancy

As CPAs gear up for tax season, they’ll find the Form 1040 series for 2011 looking much the same as that of the previous year, but only because of Congress’ 11th-hour compromise late in 2010 to keep it so. Nonetheless, a number of new features affecting individuals and businesses, such

FASB and the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) in November released a revised proposal that would create a single revenue recognition standard for both U.S. GAAP and IFRS. The standard is designed to streamline accounting for revenue across industries and correct inconsistencies in existing standards and practices. The new standard

The concept of basis is simple, but calculating basis for S corporation stock takes much of many CPA tax practitioners’ time and energy. Why is this the case? Basis measures the amount that the property’s owner is treated as having invested in the property. At the start of the investment,

The U.S. stakeholders—issuers, preparers, users, auditors, standard setters and others—have expressed concern over “the goodness of fit” of current FASB standards to public companies as well as approximately 28 million private companies and businesses. The “one size fits all” school of thought has dominated the FASB mentality. Private companies’ financial

Tax practitioners have always been cautious with the records they provide to the IRS in an audit to control the depth of an IRS inquiry. But IRS agents are starting to request client backup files from small business accounting software such as QuickBooks and Peachtree, and many practitioners are concerned

Accounting-firm mergers must overcome numerous obstacles. One of the most common—and challenging—involves compensation and benefits for partners and staff. Merging firms usually have differences in compensation levels, compensation methods and benefits packages. It’s crucial for staff and partner retention that the merging firms combine the varying systems into one without

It’s no secret that CPAs take pride in their standing as trusted advisers to their clients. What’s not so well known is that CPAs can gain—and in many cases, literally profit—from the advice of those same clients.   Client advisory boards offer CPA firms and other businesses the opportunity to