Audit & Accounting

Blaming delays in information sharing, as well as a battle over who will pick up the tab for legal fees, the trial over former KPMG partners' sales of questionably legal tax shelters won't begin until Jan. 15.

I was raised in a family of medical people: father, brother, son, to name a few. Where other kids in our neighborhood might have had a Cross or a Star of David hanging over their beds, I had a caduceus. Thus, you must immediately ask, why am I writing columns such as this? Well, the answer is relatively simple. To repeat the famous cliche, I really couldn't stand the sight of blood, especially my own.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has filed the first charges in its stock options practices investigations, charging the former chief executive of Brocade Communications Systems Inc. Gregory Reyes with misconduct linked to option grant practices.

As expected, the Financial Accounting Standards Board formally added a project to its agenda to reconsider the current accounting standards for leases.

By my count, Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Christopher Cox must have stamped out at least another couple of brushfires over these recent summer months.

Kathleen L. Casey was sworn in as the 88th Securities and Exchange Commission commissioner by Chairman Christopher Cox on Monday.

The Financial Accounting Standards Board is likely to formally add a project on lease accounting to its agenda this week, according to published reports.

Late last month, the SEC announced the institution and simultaneous settlement of an enforcement action against Morgan Stanley (Morgan Stanley & Co. Incorporated and Morgan Stanley DW Inc.). The SEC action alleged that Morgan Stanley failed to maintain and enforce adequate written policies and procedures to prevent the misuse of insider information in its possession.

More than 2,000 companies appear to have used backdated stock options, according to a new paper from professors at the University of Iowa and Indiana University.

New rules will allow the New York State Board of Regents stronger local oversight of CPAs who are disciplined by the Securities and Exchange Commission.