Finance

The U.S. Small Business Administration has issued four final rules in the Federal Register, increasing the size standards for small businesses in 70 industries, including finance.

Rep. Nydia M. Velazquez, D-N.Y., the ranking Democrat on the House Small Business Committee, has introduced two bills to foster entrepreneurship and help small firms grow and succeed.

Investors have a bit more to ponder as the administration rolls out its tax program, designed to both address the federal budget deficit and promote economic development.

The Internal Revenue Service has issued a report describing the changes it plans to address the problems with its approval process for reviewing applications for tax-exempt status.

The inability of cities and local jurisdictions to collect existing sales taxes on Internet sales translates into billions of dollars in lost revenue, according to a new report from the U.S. Conference of Mayors, that found New York City, Phoenix and Chicago as the top money-losing cities.

Electronic signatures became effective in the United States on October 1, 2000 when Congress passed the Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act.

A new study jointly conducted by the Congressional Budget Office and the Joint Committee on Taxation estimates that the bill currently under debate in the Senate would save nearly $1 trillion over the next two decades, largely because more than 10 million additional people would be paying taxes.

Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett has signed into law a measure that will allow more practical, broad-based professional experience to fulfill the requirements for getting a CPA license.

A group of lawmakers from the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee have written a letter to Treasury Secretary Jack Lew urging the Internal Revenue Service to back off of a proposed rule change modifying the retail inventory method of accounting, which retailers fear could cost them millions of dollars a year.

The Governmental Accounting Standards Board has issued for public comment a proposed concepts statement that would guide GASB when establishing standards regarding the measurement of assets and liabilities for U.S. state and local governments.

The House Financial Services Committee has unanimously passed legislation prohibiting the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board from mandating the automatic rotation of a public company’s independent external auditor.

The Internal Revenue Service may be nearing an agreement to pay unionized employees $70 million in bonuses that aren’t legally required, said Republican Senator Charles Grassley.

Leaders of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee continued their battle over the release of transcripts of interviews with officials from the Internal Revenue Service’s Exempt Organizations division amid claims of what the transcripts indicate about White House involvement in the targeting of Tea Party and other conservative groups.

New York State has suspended Deloitte Financial Advisory Services from consulting work on financial institutions regulated by the state’s Department of Financial Services, and the firm has agreed to make a $10 million payment to the state as a result of problems with Deloitte FAS’s consulting work for Standard Chartered bank.

World leaders at the G8 Summit meeting in Lough Erne, Northern Ireland, issued a declaration Tuesday calling for countries to share tax information and increase transparency to discourage tax evasion, and President Obama released an action plan for identifying actual company ownership.

Congressman Chaka Fattah, D-Pa., a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, has introduced legislation that would direct the Treasury Department to issue a legislative proposal to Congress concerning the viability of replacing the current income tax with a consumption tax.

Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and Rep. Charles Boustany, R-La., have introduced legislation aimed at allowing Enrolled Agents to present themselves as such and tout their credential wherever they practice.

The House Ways and Means Committee held a hearing Thursday to examine corporate tax reform and the impact of offshore tax havens on base erosion and profit shifting by multinationals.

Leaders of the House Energy and Commerce Committee have sent a letter to Internal Revenue Service acting chief Daniel Werfel requesting information about a March 2011 IRS search and seizure of as many as 60 million medical records from a California health care provider.

Senators Roy Blunt, R-Mo., and Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., have introduced a bipartisan bill to make the New Markets Tax Credit program permanent and increase its annual allocation.