Financial Planning

Congress gave final approval to legislation that would peg the interest rates on government-sponsored student loans to a market-based rate, ensuring that almost 9 million undergraduates will pay 3.86 percent interest on their next loan.

Whether it’s locked in audit and tax preparation systems, time and billing records, or lying dormant in individual Excel files, there’s a huge amount of value in data residing in CPA firms’ information systems simply waiting to be mined and turned into profitability and growth.

About 11 million U.S. students who need to borrow to cover their college costs would pay 3.86 percent on their next loans under legislation now headed for final passage by Congress.

Last month’s Supreme Court decision in U.S. v. Windsor held section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act to be unconstitutional.

CPA-focused business intelligence tool provider iLumen has added a survey platform as well as budgeting and forecasting capabilities to work in conjunction with its Client Intelligence and Industry Intelligence products.

The American Institute of CPAs has written a letter to members of Congress to support legislation that would block the U.S. Department of Labor’s 2010 proposal to change its definition of fiduciary under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 to include appraisers of employee stock ownership plans.

With the formal release of the 2013 AICPA Guide, Valuation of Privately-Held Company Equity Securities Issued as Compensation, there are two valuation concepts that are new to the updated guide, but are already in fairly wide use.

There’s more to estate planning than simply trying to minimize taxes under the provisions of a will and various trusts, as criticism over the will of the late James Gandolfini attests. A number of estate experts have weighed in the provisions of the will, which was filed last week in Manhattan Surrogate’s Court.

Most CPAs these days consider themselves the trusted advisor, yet few are clearly separating themselves from their competitors. iLumen chief executive Rob Ganjon explains how practitioners can look to current tools to help make that distinction.

The Internal Revenue Service has updated its static mortality tables for use by defined benefit pension plans in calculating the life expectancies of retirees.