Audit

Intuit Inc. announced that the Securities and Exchange Commission has closed its investigation into the software maker's stock option accounting practices without taking any punitive action.The SEC began its Intuit inquiry in June and in August, Intuit announced that based on its internal investigation of the handling of its stock options dating back to 1997, it wouldn’t need to restate past profits.

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board today announced 1- new appointments and six reappointments to its Standing Advisory Group for 2007.In May 2006, the board began soliciting nominations to fill the slots -- receiving more than 110 nominations and re-nominations. From that list, the board selected individuals with expertise in a variety of fields, including accounting, auditing, corporate finance, corporate governance, and investing in public companies.

According to the American Society of Appraisers, many chief executives and company presidents simply don’t know what their own company is worth and, as a result, they are making corporate decisions from an unenviable position.So, the society is now offering specific tips to understand why every company needs to have a current business valuation.

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board will host a forum in New York to bring information to the small business community.The forum on auditing in the small business environment is a program designed to help registered accounting firms and public companies working in the small business community learn more about the work of the board. The forum will focus specifically on the PCAOB inspections process and the impact of new auditing standards.

The Financial Accounting Standards Board has voted to propose changes to a derivatives rule issued earlier this year affecting the financial statements of asset-backed and mortgage-backed securities investors.The proposal would affect FASB Statement No. 155, “Accounting for Certain Hybrid Financial Instruments,” and allow companies not to account for embedded derivatives that are associated with prepayment risks. Community banks, insurance companies and others may be exempted from having to recognize interest-rate-driven gains and losses on their income statements. Many of those groups had said without such an exemption, their earnings might be more volatile.

Six Deloitte member firms -- located in the Bahamas, Barbados, Bermuda, the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands and Jamaica -- will join together to create Deloitte Caribbean/Bermuda.

Next month will mark my second anniversary of being involved in-depth with the accounting profession. And I don’t think much more than a work day has ever passed without Jeffrey Skilling popping up in some fashion or another.

I always believed that New York had a deserved reputation of aggressively going after individuals regarding whether they have New York residency with regard to collection of its income and estate taxes.

At the end of the massive Enron accounting scandal, the burden of serving hard time has fallen to former chief executive Jeffrey Skilling, who was sentenced to 24 years and four months in jail as he continued to maintain his innocence five years after the energy giant's historical collapse.Skilling, 52, also faces fines of $18 million, a lesser amount than the $100 million in reparations and fines sought by federal prosecutors. Lake also approved a payment of $45 million from Skilling to former employees who lost money in Enron's pension funds was also approved.

The partners of a pair of Charleston, S.C., accounting firms announced that on the heels of a merger, their business will be acquired by regional accounting firm Dixon Hughes PLLC.Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The Rehmann Group announced plans to merge with Farmington Hills, Mich.-based Boyes, Wright, Pittman & Co. PLLC and Traverse City, Mich.-based Weber, Curtin & Pahssen LLC, in a deal effective Jan. 1, 2007.Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Former U.S. Treasury secretary and Harvard University president Lawrence H. Summers will join New York hedge fund firm D.E. Shaw & Co. as a part-time managing director."Larry is an enormously gifted economist and has made major contributions as a researcher, a public servant and an academic leader," David Shaw, chairman of the $25-billion fund manager, said in a statement.

I’ve heard it repeated time and time again that the Baby Boomers are heading for the proverbial fiscal train wreck because they are simply under funded, notwithstanding repeated warnings all over the landscape about the need to save money.

In a second October acquisition, Clifton Gunderson LLP announced that it will acquire the Schaumburg, Ill.-based firm of Nykiel, Carlin & Co. Ltd.

The Internal Revenue Service announced adjustments to the dollar limitations set for pension plans in the 2007 tax year.

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board has issued staff questions and answers about auditing the value of stock options granted to employees.The guidance provides direction for auditing a company’s estimation of the fair value of stock options granted to employees under its revised statement on share-based payments, standard, No. 123. The standard became applicable for financial statements of companies with fiscal years ending on or after June 15, 2006.

In a move that wasn’t unexpected, a judge vacated the conspiracy and fraud conviction against the late founder and former chairman of Enron Corp., Ken Lay.U.S. District Judge Sim Lake also granted the request by Lay's estate to dismiss the indictment used to bring Lay to trial. Lay died of a heart attack in early July, less than two months after a jury convicted him on six charges of conspiracy and fraud and Lake found him guilty on four charges of bank fraud.

The managing executive of the Crowe Chizek’s Commercial Services Group will become the chief executive of Crowe Group LLP in April.Charles “Chuck” Allen, 53, will succeed Mark L. Hildebrand, who is completing his second term as the head of the firm. Hildebrand was first named chief executive in 1999.

What’s becoming increasingly apparent as more and more companies reveal the results of internal investigations into the timing of stock options grants to executives, is that there’s really no cut and dry, right or wrong, when it comes to the practice.According to published reports and independent research groups, upwards of 130 publicly traded companies have announced that they are looking into their own options-granting practices -- and the actual number is surely much, much higher than that. But with many of those investigations wrapping up, what comes now?

Grant Thornton LLP, the U.S. member firm of Grant Thornton International, reported that its revenues for the 2006 fiscal year were up 22 percent, to $886 million.Among the firm’s highlights for the year ended July 31, 2006: