Public companies and their auditors will have some added leeway to ensure compliance with still unfinalized Public Company Accounting Oversight Board rules restricting the kinds of tax services auditors can provide.

For the 2005 fiscal year, just 30 out of the country's more than 180,000 millionaires received a face-to-face audit from the Internal Revenue Service, according to Syracuse University's Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse.

The prosecution has rested in the ninth week of the government's fraud and conspiracy trial of former Enron chairman Kenneth Lay and chief executive Jeffrey Skilling.

A survey of public company filings has revealed that the spike in audit fees under the early years of Sarbanes-Oxley may really have been temporary, though fees did increase in 2005.

The International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board has re-issued an exposure draft titled "The Audit of Group Financial Statements."

The former chief of defense contractor Raytheon Co. will reportedly pay a civil fine and return part of his 2000 bonus as part of a tentative settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Sen. Paul Sarbanes, D-Maryland, spoke out in strong defense of the corporate accounting legislation that bears his name last week, in a speech before the Consumer Federation of America.

Chief financial officers offered some strong opinions on the Securities and Exchange Commission's proposal to expand disclosure of executive compensation, according to the first quarter "CFO Outlook Survey," conducted by Financial Executives International and Baruch College's Zicklin School of Business.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has begun a formal investigation of Mills Corp. after more than two months of informally looking into accounting problems at the shopping mall real-estate investment trust.

Two overseas auditors have been charged by the Securities and Exchange Commission for alleged misconduct in the audits of British software company AremisSoft Corp.

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board said that it won't publicly release the control problems and structural deficiencies uncovered at the Big Four firms during its initial round of inspection reports.

After months of speculation, Google rolled out a beta version of Google Finance on March 21, its own site bringing together pertinent information from across the Web about companies and mutual funds.

In the latest turf battle to come to light between the two groups, the American Institute of CPAs and the National Association of State Boards of Accountancy recently squabbled over NASBA's interest in the details of public company audit inspection reports.

The Financial Accounting Standards Board released a statement aimed at simplifying the accounting for servicing assets and liabilities, such as those common to mortgage securitization activities.

Risk consulting and internal audit services provider Protiviti has teamed with enterprise software company diCarta to provide a contract management compliance solution for Protiviti clients.

The Internal Revenue Service's 2005 IRS Data Book is now available at the agency's Web site.

A business group including some of the country's largest companies said that corporate governance practices are improving and that the percentage of companies adopting pay-for-performance measures for senior executives continues to rise.

A paper from the Governmental Accounting Standards Board has outlined key differences between the needs of users of state and local government financial information and users interested in for-profit businesses.

CPA and business advisory firm Hill, Barth and King, has merged in Presque Isle Capital Management with its financial planning unit HBK Sorce Advisory LLC.

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board named Laura Phillips and Jennifer Rand to the position of deputy chief auditor.