A new accounting standard is giving executives second thoughts about plans for mergers and acquisitions.

The number of financial restatements finally began to decline last year after a decade-long increase and will probably continue to fall as the Securities and Exchange Commission makes it easier for companies to avoid restatements that aren't likely to greatly affect investors.

The Institute of International Finance, a global association of financial institutions, has moved to clarify its position on fair value accounting after word leaked out that it wanted to loosen the standards, provoking an outcry.

While late-year legislative changes again delayed filing for some taxpayers, the season proceeded relatively smoothly, according to veteran practitioners.“It was one of the smoothest ones I’ve had, and my colleagues say the same. In part it’s because the software is getting better,” said Holliston, Mass.-based preparer Larry Novick. “I did notice that a lot fewer of my clients claimed non-cash contributions, and the amount of collection plate contributions decreased substantially. Most of them had heard of the stricter substantiation rules.”

For those CPAs performing business valuations, January brought a new standard into their sphere, a long-awaited pronouncement that has garnered both praise and some mixed reviews.Despite the critique, most business valuation appraisers said that the American Institute of CPAs’ Statement on Standards for Valuation Services No. 1 was a long time coming, though it hasn’t drastically affected their day-to-day practices.

The American Institute of CPAs has begun publicizing the revised set of peer review standards that it quietly issued earlier this year.The new standards are designed to be more principles-based and less of a checklist-based process than older peer review standards. A key difference is the elimination of letters of comment and the old three-tier system of unmodified, modified and adverse grades given to firms by reviewers. The new standards require a simple grade of “pass,” “pass with deficiencies” or “fail.”

In a good news/bad news scenario for many publicly traded companies, a recent poll of financial executives showed that while the costs of audit fees rose in year-over-year comparisons, there was a marked decline in Sarbanes-Oxley 404 compliance expenses.According to a recent survey of 185 companies conducted by Financial Executives International, larger companies, or accelerated public filers — which comprised about 90 percent of the respondents — spent an average of $3.6 million on total audit fees last year, up nearly 2 percent from 2006.