The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board is facing an uncertain future after several justices on the high court appeared to side with the accounting firm and conservative group that hope to prove the board is unconstitutional.

The International Accounting Standards Board has published a new standard on classifying and measuring financial assets to determine whether an asset should be measured at amortized cost or fair value.

IMGCAP(1)]Opaque financial instruments that banks and insurance companies have created and misrepresented, and that were blamed for the current recession, seem to call for greater transparency. But what exactly is transparency? How is it done? Does it work?

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board has received mostly negative comments on a recent proposal to require engagement partners with final responsibility for an audit to sign the audit report, and it may end up abandoning the idea.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission “never took the necessary and basic steps” that would have led to the agency uncovering Bernard L. Madoff’s $65 billion Ponzi scheme, according to the full report issued Friday by the agency’s Inspector-General.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged Las Vegas accountant Michael J. Moore and his auditing firm Moore & Associates with issuing false auditing reports prepared by high school graduates who had little to no experience with accounting or auditing.

With trillion-dollar deficits, cap-and-trade and nationalized health care on the horizon, the issues involving the possible registering and licensing of tax preparers seem trivial. Yet the ability to fund the deficits and pay for a nationalized health care system ultimately depends on the ability of the federal government to collect tax.