The chairman of a House appropriations subcommittee with oversight of the Securities and Exchange Commission, has called on the Government Accountability Office to investigate reported SEC budget shortfalls.

While Section 404 of Sarbanes-Oxley says management is responsible for establishing and reporting on a company's system of internal controls, more than half of 329 companies reporting control deficiency disclosures did so because their external auditors identified and reported those weaknesses, according to a report by the Financial Executives Research Foundation.

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board revoked the registration of a New York public accounting firm and disciplined three of its partners for concealing information from the board and submitting false information in connection with a PCAOB inspection.

A bipartisan coalition of members of the U.S. Senate Finance Committee, including chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa; ranking member Max Baucus, D-Mont.; Ron Wyden, D-Ore.; and Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., have introduced legislation to repeal the alternative minimum tax.

Reiterating the Financial Accounting Standards Board's 2005 goal of simplification, FASB Chairman Robert Herz told attendees at the American Institute of CPAs Spring Meeting of Council that the regulatory climate has reopened such issues as differential standards and the codification of generally accepted accounting principles, thus intensifying the need to hone standards and reduce the number of accounting guidance outlets.

The American Institute of CPAs lauded the introduction of legislation this week that would amend the privacy provision of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act applicable to CPAs.

In response to requests from tax practitioners and professional organizations for clarification, the Internal Revenue Service and the Treasury Department issued revisions to the new Circular 230 standards -- rules related to written tax advice issued last December.