Audit

Members of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board may be breathing a sigh of relief that their organization has been ruled constitutional, but their opponents could decide to take their case to the Supreme Court.

The Securities and Exchange Commission proposed setting a roadmap for transitioning to International Financial Reporting Standards by 2014.

The Public Company Accountability Oversight Board hailed a decision by an appeals court that upheld its constitutionality.

AccuFund has enhanced its AccuFund Accounting Suite with point-of-sale and electronic funds transfer features.

According to recent surveys, Americans are lacking in preparation for retirement. In fact, many have little or absolutely no idea of how to achieve certain goals. To the rescue comes WealthRidge which is offering a free retirement planning White Paper to help people get on track to financial well-being in retirement. "Facts You Need To Know About Retirement Planning" can be obtained via www.wealthridge.com. Wealthridge points out that more than 65 percent of all retirees have saved less than $100,000, and they find that is nowhere near enough money for retirement. Michael Snowdon, CFP®, financial planning partner in WealthRidge says, "It's not uncommon to live in retirement for 20 or 30 years. Finding the funding to support those years has become, for many, an exercise in futility." Why? Here's an example he cites. An individual who wants to have an income of $75,000 per year in retirement, plans to retire in 15 years, and to live for 30 more years, may need as much as $2 million to fund the desired retirement income. How so? Because health care expenses represent a significant factor. A recent study suggests that a couple who reaches age 65 will need more than $200,000 to pay for their retirement health care expenses. With fewer company pensions, and living expenses at all-time highs, saving enough money for retirement can seem to be an almost impossible task. There are solutions, notes Wealthridge, and people can achieve their goals. They say that the retirement planning White Paper provides answers to how much money will be needed for retirement, how much healthcare will cost, and how much retirees can safely withdraw from their retirement portfolio to make sure it lasts as long as they do. The White Paper also identifies the tools that are available to save for retirement, along with some cautions about what not to do. For additional information, feel free to contact Michael Snowdon at (888) 326-5557. WealthRidge is an independent fee-based financial planning firm in the Denver metro area.

The New York State Society of CPAs plans to welcome a series of speakers from the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board to its September 10 conference on current developments under Sarbanes-Oxley.

The Financial Accounting Standards Board has added the topic of business combinations to its accounting standards codification, which aims to organize the thousands of U.S. accounting pronouncements issued by multiple standard-setters into a single authoritative source.

The Securities and Exchange Commission is soliciting comments on a new auditing standard for evaluating the consistency of financial statements.

SEC Chairman Christopher Cox hailed an appeals court decision that said the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board is constitutional.

PricewaterhouseCoopers plans to reorganize its international network of member accounting firms, splitting them into three major geographic clusters.

Ascend, the national Asian-American society of accountants, held its first major conference in New York this week.

Deloitte & Touche has signed a memorandum of understanding with Canadian accounting firm Scott Rankin & Gardner for a potential merger.

Accounting firm Citrin Cooperman has appointed longtime partner F. Wayne Holton CEO.

The Securities and Exchange Commission unveiled its next-generation system for online financial filings, IDEA, the successor to its EDGAR database.

A group representing financial executives has written to the Financial Accounting Standards Board asking to exempt private companies from the requirements of FASB Interpretation No. 48, "Accounting for Uncertainty in Income Taxes."

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board has issued its latest inspection report on KPMG, listing deficiencies in several sample audits conducted by the firm.

More than 65 percent of the CFOs and 70 percent of the audit committee members surveyed by accounting firm Crowe Chizek cited managing enterprise risk as the biggest challenge facing their organizations over the next 12 months.

The Securities and Exchange Commission said it would distribute millions of dollars to investors harmed by market-timing trading violations in mutual funds managed by Putnam Investment Management and Janus Capital Management.

Real estate mortgage schemes, foreclosure activities, equity stripping and fraud are booming. Individuals mastermind multi-tiered structures designed to hide participants or obfuscate relationships. They often have intentionally incomplete or poor financial records. These cases ordinarily involve desperate or opportunistic actions by very bright individuals, all connected by ambiguous documentation and well-hidden trails. As a result, the research, discovery, assessments, valuations and case preparation can become extremely complex.With the advancement of technology, new avenues for fraud, criminal behavior and outright negligence are surfacing. Now e-mail, cell phones and electronic monitoring systems provide volumes of information that can be used to discover the “smoking gun” in fraud cases. Using this electronic data and other hard-copy archives, the forensic investigation team, working closely with case attorneys and clients, sift through enormous volumes of documents to identify the possibility of fraud, financial reporting negligence, “cooked books” or other potential corruption.

PARKWAY PROPERTIES DISMISSES E&YParkway Properties Inc., a Jackson, Miss.-based real estate investment trust, dismissed auditor Ernst & Young LLP and engaged KPMG as its new independent accountant.