As a young man, I was a crewmember of a 747 that crashed on takeoff in Kenya. The airline's emergency planning helped me keep cool, think rationally and help save the lives of 90 of the 149 passengers.Today, as principal of a financial advisory firm in Irvine, Calif., I regularly see people approach retirement planning like an airline flight, hoping the unthinkable won't happen. But while the chances of a crash are remote, the financial markets are considerably less predictable. Few are prepared for the transition from earnings income to portfolio income.

STUDY: RIAS NEED TO DIFFERENTIATEA study commissioned by Pershing Advisor Solutions projects that as the market for financial services becomes even more competitive, registered investment advisors need to "fine tune" their area of expertise and promote their reputations of specialized knowledge in a given niche. The report said that specialization is crucial, given that consumers who seek financial advice are becoming more sophisticated in their market knowledge, and thus are sparking a growing demand for qualified individuals.

The many practitioners who conduct valuations in the normal course of their practices will shortly be required to follow, for the first time, detailed standards, because the Consulting Services Executive Committee of the American Institute of CPAs has issued a comprehensive professional statement of standards - Statement on Standards for Valuation Services No. 1, Valuation of a Business, Business Ownership Interest, Security or Intangible Asset."The AICPA developed the valuation standard to improve the consistency and quality of practice among its members who perform engagements that estimate values for various reasons," said AICPA president and CEO Barry Melancon, in a statement. "Congress, government agencies and accounting regulators have recently focused their attention on appraisal issues - such activity shows the importance of valuation to the business community and individuals. The standard promotes greater transparency and provides our members with a set of guidelines in the unique context of a CPA practice."

The Internal Revenue Service has lost the first round in a much-anticipated test case against Textron Inc., in which it sought judicial approval for a new program seeking tax accrual workpapers during the examination of corporate clients.The IRS is interested in Textron's and others' workpapers, since they document what the company considers its questionable tax positions.

The Internal Revenue Service is not doing enough to match incorrect or missing identification numbers on income and wage statements with existing tax accounts, charged the Treasury Inspector General for Tax AdministrationThe TIGTA noted that in tax year 2004 alone, the IRS received about 3.8 million income statements reporting approximately $150 billion in earnings that could not be matched to a filed tax return because of missing or erroneous ID numbers. Compared to 2001, that represented a 63 percent increase.

In a vote that may have a wide-ranging effect on the accounting profession, House lawmakers voted 220-175 to overhaul patent rules and place a ban on tax-planning-method patents.HR 1908, the Patent Reform Act of 2007, primarily contains provisions that would make it harder to get patents and harder for companies to be sued for patent infringement. However, it also contains a provision that would protect accounting firms from lawsuits over tax-planning methods.

The deadline for compliance with final Section 409A regulations, scheduled for Dec. 31, 2007, should be extended for a year, according to 92 of the largest law firms in the nation.The new regulations, finalized in April, require deferred-compensation plans to be amended to comply with the Internal Revenue Code.

The last few months have seen the problems in sub-prime lending start to have a national and even international impact on the credit and stock markets.The combination of expanded sub-prime lending programs with mortgage rates that adjust upward after two to five years, reduced or eliminated down-payment requirements, and a housing market that has seen real estate prices actually decline in many markets, has left many marginal borrowers unable to pay higher monthly mortgage payments, unable to refinance to more traditional mortgages, and unable to sell homes at a price sufficient to cover the mortgage obligation.

Leave it to the guys from Harvard, eh? Right now, when everybody and his cat are trying to figure out what’s happening in the stock market, three entrepreneurs out of Cambridge, Mass. are gathering the best financial minds in the business to figure it all out for you. It’s called Fantasy Investing and it can be found at www.updown.com. This is a Web site launched by these Harvard Business School students. Each partner, it is said, has a significant start-up experience, and shares a common vision to revolutionize the investing world. In effect, The UpDown is a community for stock investors.

Small businesses accounted for the bulk of new jobs in September, adding 53,000 of the 58,000 new jobs in non-farm private employment, according to a report by payroll-processing giant ADP.

The International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board issued new requirements for auditing group financial statements.

Ernst & Young Chairman and CEO James S. Turley has been appointed chair of the governing board of the Center for Audit Quality to help improve investor confidence in the audit process.

Tax technology vendor Vertex said it planned a major hiring initiative that would double the size of its consulting group over the next six months.

Software developer Rivet Software is introducing software to convert financial reports and documents into the interactive format that the Securities and Exchange Commission has been promoting.

Former Dynegy CFO Robert Doty Jr. will pay the Securities and Exchange Commission $375,000 for his role in a $300 million accounting fraud.

AICPA CEO Barry Melancon and other accounting profession luminaries have been appointed to the Treasury Department's new Advisory Committee on the Auditing Profession.

The trend toward convergence of accounting standards seems to be picking up speed after a bumpy start, but there are still plenty of hurdles ahead.

Robert Herz, chairman of the Financial Accounting Standards Board, has said he is in favor of a single set of global accounting standards.

The Internal Revenue Service has issued a new set of allowable living expense standards that it will use to determine the ability of a taxpayer to pay a delinquent tax liability.

Deloitte Consulting, Cisco Systems, SAP and the Open Compliance and Ethics Group have released a study indicating the dangers of fragmented approaches to governance, risk and compliance.