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Turning Business Losses Into Tax Refunds

 Businesses with a need for a cash infusion may be able to obtain one quickly as a result of a tax refund from recently expanded net operating loss (NOL) carryback allowances. These provisions address the fact that, although a net loss may appear in only one tax year, it represents

Little Change for PCAOB Under High Court Ruling

The Supreme Court’s 5–4 decision Monday in the constitutional challenge to the PCAOB will leave the agency virtually unchanged. The court’s ruling will not affect day-to-day operations of the PCAOB, the agency said. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion. In it, he said the court was isolating, or

Banking Regulators Issue Final Guidance for Safe and Sound Compensation Practices

The Federal Reserve, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the Office of Thrift Supervision and the FDIC issued final guidance to ensure that incentive compensation arrangements at financial organizations take risk into account and are consistent with safe and sound practices. The guidance is designed to ensure that

Audit Committee Considerations for Whistleblower Hotlines

Audit committees should consider the following questions when assessing the design effectiveness of a hotline:   Does the hotline have a dedicated hotline number, fax number, website, e-mail address, and regular mail or post office box address to expedite reports of suspected incidents of misconduct? Does the hotline demonstrate confidentiality,

New GAAP for Multiple Deliverables

Many companies, large and small, offer a broad range of products and services to their customers. Often these product and service sales are negotiated at the same time with a single customer, resulting in a single contractually binding arrangement with multiple deliverables. Consider the cell phone company that provides a

Firm Up Your Data Security

Given the many threats organizations face in protecting critical information and processes, an information security policy is arguably one of the most important documents an organization can create. Consider these best practices for creating a new security policy and keeping an existing policy up to date. —By Ron Box, CPA/CITP/CFF,

Banking

The federal banking agencies, in conjunction with the Conference of State Bank Supervisors (CSBS), released a policy statement on their expectations for sound funding and liquidity risk management practices. The Interagency Policy Statement on Funding and Liquidity Risk Management, adopted by the FDIC, the Federal Reserve, the Office of the

ESOP Article Overdue

I am a CFO associated with a 100% employee-owned company. I found Scott Miller’s article (“The ESOP Exit Strategy,” March 10, page 32) very timely and long overdue. It is my opinion that the ESOP tool is one of the best—if not the best—available tools for owners of companies to

News Highlights for June 2010

The PCAOB proposed for comment an auditing standard, Communications with Audit Committees, and a series of related amendments to its interim standards. The proposal includes a requirement for the auditor to establish a mutual understanding of the terms of the audit engagement with the audit committee and to document that

Jobs Key to Consumer Confidence

Job growth is at the heart of increasing consumer confidence and growing the economy, Quincy Krosby, chief market strategist for Prudential Financial, told AICPA Council members Tuesday in San Diego. “If we don’t bring the word ‘confidence’ in, small business owners will be afraid to hire. They are worried about

Economic Outlook Turns Optimistic

For the first time in more than two years, CPA financial executives were more optimistic than pessimistic about the outlook for the U.S. economy, according to a quarterly survey conducted by the AICPA and the University of North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler Business School, but more than half don’t expect full economic

Chow, Anderson and Dekker Receive Awards in Management Accounting

The AICPA recently sponsored two Management Accounting Awards presented at the American Accounting Association’s midyear meeting. Chee Chow, an accounting professor at the San Diego State University College of Business Administration, received the Lifetime Contribution to Management Accounting Award. Shannon Anderson, associate professor of management at Rice University in Houston,

Report Assesses Enterprise Risk Management Outlook

Risk management processes within businesses continue to be relatively immature and ad hoc despite increased volume and complexity of risks, according to a study published by N.C. State University’s ERM Initiative in partnership with AICPA’s Business, Industry, & Government Team. The second annual study, 2010 Report on the Current State

Fed Issues Final Rules on Gift Card Fees, Expiration Dates

The Federal Reserve Board on Tuesday released final rules that restrict the fees and expiration dates that apply to gift cards. The rules are intended to protect consumers from certain unexpected costs and require that gift card terms and conditions be clearly stated. The rules go into effect Aug. 22.

Comment Deadlines Nearing for Certain Clarified Exposure Drafts

The Auditing Standards Board recently issued additional Proposed Statements on Auditing Standards resulting from its clarity project, through which all of its auditing standards will be redrafted over the next one to two years.  The goal of the clarity project is to make auditing standards easier to read, understand and

Guidance Intended to Help Institutions Fight Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing

The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) and several other financial institution regulators issued guidance to clarify and consolidate existing regulatory expectations for obtaining beneficial ownership information for certain accounts and customer relationships—information that the agencies said can help financial institutions better understand and address money laundering and terrorist financing risks,

How the R&D Tax Credit Is Calculated

Editor’s note: This is a Web-exclusive sidebar to “Navigating the R&D Tax Credit,” in the March 2010 issue of the JofA.   Regular research credit. The RRC is an incremental credit that equals 20% of a taxpayer’s current-year QREs that exceed a base amount, which is determined by applying the

Navigating the R&D Tax Credit

Although it has a well-deserved reputation for complexity and uncertainty for taxpayers, the research tax credit of IRC § 41 nonetheless remains a valuable source of support to businesses that conduct qualified research and development. In fiscal year 2009 alone, the credit represented an estimated $5.6 billion federal subsidy for

How to Get Experience in M&A-Related Disputes

Editor’s note: This is a sidebar to “The CPA’s Role in Quantifying Post-Acquisition Dispute Damages,” March 2010.   Most CPAs with an accounting and auditing background have advised a client who has acquired or sold a business or business interest. Disputes may arise related to the M&A transaction as outlined

The CPA’s Role in Quantifying Post-Acquisition Dispute Damages

Given today’s environment of bankruptcies, bank failures and recessionary pressure, consummating merger and acquisition transactions is more challenging than ever. The potential disputes arising from the challenges of an M&A transaction are numerous. The following two types of disputes are the focus of this article: working capital disputes regarding whether

FROM THIS MONTH'S ISSUE

Build reusable Skills in Anthropic’s Claude AI

Instead of rewriting prompts each time, CPAs can turn routine tasks into reusable AI Skills. This Technology Q&A walks through how to build Claude Skills that process files, ask setup questions, and export clean Excel outputs.