Regulatory actions and programs

House Committee on Small Business chairwoman Nydia Velázquez, D-N.Y., has written to the chairmen of two other House committees asking for changes in health care reform legislation to reduce the burden on small businesses.

The Financial Crisis Advisory Group has published a report concluding that accounting standards are not to blame for the economic crisis.

New York State CPAs are facing a Sunday deadline to register with the State Education Department under a recently passed law.

Slightly more than half of small and midsized businesses prefer to have a separate set of accounting standards for private companies, according to a new survey by Deloitte.

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board has scheduled an open meeting next week to discuss making changes in engagement quality auditing and sign-off requirements.

The task of making financial reporting simpler and more useful isn’t so simple as one might hope, according to several influential accounting officials who met to discuss the problem.

Small-business owners and industry representatives told a House committee that the tax breaks in the stimulus package passed by Congress in February have helped some companies.

The Senate has voted unanimously to reauthorize the Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer programs for eight more years and make several changes to the programs that provide monetary awards to small businesses.

The International Accounting Standards Board has proposed changing the accounting standards for measuring and classifying financial instruments in response to concerns raised by the financial crisis.

Turmoil in the financial markets has negated the value of fair value accounting, according to more than half the respondents to a new survey.

The International Federation of Accountants and the International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants have issued a revised Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants that strengthens the independence requirements of auditors.

The Financial Accounting Standards Board has added a new project to its agenda aimed at making financial disclosures more organized and less redundant.

Entrepreneurs urged lawmakers to extend the research and development tax credit at a House subcommittee hearing Thursday.

The International Accounting Standards Board has published a stripped-down set of International Financial Reporting Standards aimed at small and midsized privately held businesses.

Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, has introduced a bill to lower the tax burden on small businesses.

CCH said it is supporting the new FASB Accounting Standards Codification in its CCH Accounting Research Manager service.

The Financial Accounting Standards Board has officially launched its FASB Accounting Standards Codification, an online interactive research tool that will serve as the single source of authoritative nongovernmental U.S. generally accepted accounting principles.

The Obama administration has sent legislation to Capitol Hill to create a new Consumer Financial Protection Agency.

The Private Company Financial Reporting Committee met to discuss topics ranging from revenue recognition to FIN 48-d and loan-loss contingencies.

Financial Accounting Standards Board Chairman Robert Herz refuses to accept the inevitability of another financial system collapse.