Audit

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board has released critical inspection reports for the audits of PricewaterhouseCoopers and Ernst & Young, saying that the firms' work has so many deficiencies, their evaluations of companies' finances may be questionable.

Financial Executives Research Foundation, the research affiliate of Financial Executives International, has released two new reports on Sarbanes-Oxley compliance and management reports on internal controls.

By a wide majority, the Senate passed legislation to hopefully strengthen corporate pension programs and provide aid to pension insurance agencies already in debt. A similar bill rewriting pension rules has received approval from two House committees.

There is a clear link between Sarbanes-Oxley Section 404 compliance work and dramatically higher profiles for senior tax executives, particularly with audit committees and boards of directors, according to a survey of senior tax executives conducted by KPMG.

The Securities and Exchange Commission's 2005 financial statements got a clean bill of health from the Government Accountability Office, after the SEC accelerated its financial reporting schedule to issue the documents.

Louisiana has chosen Deloitte & Touche to provide oversight of the state's receipt and delivery of federal aid recovery funds.

Bail was denied to one of the former KPMG partners charged by the federal government in connection with the sale of allegedly fraudulent tax shelters.

More than two-thirds of all small businesses favor setting different Sarbanes-Oxley compliance standards for small and large companies, according to a recent study commissioned by SAP America Inc.

Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Christopher Cox named Scott Taub as the agency's acting chief accountant.

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board announced new appointments and re-appointments to its Standing Advisory Group for 2006.

The Financial Accounting Standards Board will add a new project to its agenda and reconsider its accounting guidance for pensions and other retirement benefits.

The upcoming International Standards Organization's 22222 standard is now in a final ballot, with the objective of achieving and promoting a globally accepted benchmark for individuals who provide the professional service of personal financial planning.

Big Four firm PricewaterhouseCoopers and technology and electronics concern Hitachi America have partnered on a program integrating Hitachi's proprietary XBRL product with PwC's audit management software.

Bond insurer MBIA Inc. will restate its earnings for the past seven years, as well as set aside $75 million in anticipation of settling with regulators over an accounting probe into defaulted bonds.

The U.K. government proposed legislation last week that could limit the liability accounting firms face when auditing publicly traded companies.

PricewaterhouseCoopers will pay about $28 million to shareholders of Telxon Corp., finally putting an end to legislation concerning the high-tech manufacturer.

Securities and Exchange Commission deputy chief accountant Andrew D. Bailey Jr. will leave the commission in December.

In a former life covering sports, I was once assigned to a late-season game between the New York Mets and the Chicago Cubs. It seemed back then that most every season for the Cubs was eerily similar to Groundhog Day, where a cynical weatherman played by Bill Murray is forced to relive the worst day of his life over and over.Entering that season, the Cubbies once again were optimistic - as were the weary faithful at Wrigley Field - that they could seriously contend for a pennant, as they had miraculously done just two years before. But the team finished with roughly 70 wins versus 90 losses, which was good enough to earn them fifth place in the standings.

The Internal Revenue Service released its enforcement results for fiscal year 2005.

As part of a handful of executive appointments, Jack T. Taylor has been named to the newly created position of executive vice chair of operations for KPMG LLP.