The Latest

Wiss & Co. has merged with Behan, Ling and Ruta CPAs PC, a New York-based wealth management firm.Financial terms of the deal, which became effective April 1, were not disclosed.

The 2007 tax filing season set a number of records at the Internal Revenue Service -- highlighted by the more than 76 million electronically filed individual tax returns and more than 140 million visits to the IRS Web site.

For every achievement that the Internal Revenue Service reaches when it comes to technology, there seems to remain a disconnect with the agency’s capability of fulfilling its longer-term strategic plans.

The Securities and Exchange Commission will drop its fight against a court decision putting more restrictions on Wall Street brokers who oversee $300 billion in clients' cash.

Rankings can be very subjective, but they are still captivating. Everyone has an opinion of what they think is the best movie or song. As a Baby Boomer, I remember for years listening to a local station’s Top 500 classic rock and roll rankings to see if “In the Still of The Night,” was still ranked No 1.

A federal court in Chicago has barred Neal and Royanne Reddy and their corporation, Royanne & Co. Inc., from preparing tax returns, the Justice Department announced.The court found that the Reddys, whose business offices are in Marseilles and Princeton, Ill., prepared more than 15,000 tax returns between 2002 and 2005.

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board has named Mary Moore Hamrick as director of its newly established Office of External Relations.The public affairs and government relations offices will now be combined under the single communications department. To head those offices, the board also announced that two new deputy directors have joined the board. Colleen Brennan will head up public affairs activities, while Kent Bonham will oversee government relations.

Amper, Politziner & Mattia CPAs and Consultants, announced that Martin I. Blaustein and the staff of White Plains, N.Y.-based Blaustein & Co. LLP have joined the firm.

Churches, charities and other tax-exempt organizations that paid the federal excise tax on long-distance or bundled telephone service qualify for this year’s one-time telephone excise tax refund, according to the Internal Revenue Service.

Penthouse International Inc. has settled charges of accounting fraud and financial reporting violations, the Securities and Exchange Commission announced last week.Former Penthouse executive Charles Samel and former shareholder Jason Galanis will both pay $60,000 to settle accounting fraud charges and be barred for five years from serving as officers or directors of any public company, although neither man admitted or denied wrongdoing as part of the settlement.