Customer Takes Over Vendor’s Finance Operation

There are three dominant players in the burgeoning robotic process automation sector, which is increasingly providing potentially game-changing efficiency tools, mostly for large companies.Blue Prism, the oldest and original market leader, coined the term “robotic automation” in 2012. Automation ...

By David McCann • March 27, 2019

J.C. Penney Hires Vitamin Shoppe CFO Bill Wafford

J.C. Penney named Bill Wafford as the company’s new executive vice president and chief financial officer, starting April 8.Wafford most recently served as executive vice president and CFO for The Vitamin Shoppe, where he played a significant role in reducing debt, decreasing inventory, and improv...

By Lauren Muskett • March 27, 2019

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Top 5 stories from CFO.com

From CPA licensure changes to undergoing a digital transformation, these are the most popular stories CFOs are reading. 

By CFO.com staff

New Loss Accounting Rule Will Dent Some Banks’ Capital Levels

The change in the way U.S. financial institutions report and account for loan losses will have an unequal effect on U.S. banks’ capital levels. But the overall industry impact will be a decline in the aggregate Tier 1 capital ratio, according to S&P Global Ratings.The Financial Accounting Sta...

By Vincent Ryan • March 26, 2019

Welcome to CFO’s New Website!

If you’re observant, and even if you’re not, you may notice something different today: CFO.com has a new look and feel. Here’s a guide to some of the new features:Latest Articles. You will now see our most recently published stories on the right-hand side of the home page. For a whole page of the...

By Vincent Ryan • March 25, 2019

How to De-risk a Pension Plan in 2019

Changes in interest rates, Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. premiums, and mortality assumptions may affect plan sponsors’ decisions to de-risk (or not de-risk) defined benefit plan liabilities in 2019.Note that for purposes of this article, by “de-risking” we mean paying out a participant’s benefit...

By David McCann • March 25, 2019

CFOs on the Move: Week Ending March 22

Ford has chosen Tim Stone to lead the finance function to replace Bob Shanks, who is retiring at the end of the year. Stone resigned as finance chief at Snap in January after less than a year on the job. He had previously spent 20 years at AmazonAnnie Lee Interscope Geffen A&M Records promote...

By Joan Urdang • March 22, 2019

Ford Names Ex-Amazon Exec Tim Stone as CFO

Ford Motor is turning to the tech world for its new CFO, naming Tim Stone, formerly with Amazon and Snap, to replace Bob Shanks.Stone, 52, resigned as finance chief at Snap, the parent of the Snapchat app, in January after less than a year on the job. He had previously spent 20 years at Amazon, r...

By Matthew Heller • March 21, 2019

SEC Seeks Contempt Sanctions for Musk

The Securities and Exchange Commission has filed a court motion to hold Elon Musk in contempt for violating the terms of a 2018 settlement agreement over his social media use.Regulators said Musk has not made a “good faith effort” to comply with the settlement, which stemmed from an August 2018 i...

By Lauren Muskett • March 20, 2019

Factory Orders Tick Up Modestly

Orders for U.S.-made goods rose 0.1% in January, according to the latest figures released by the Commerce Department. Economists had expected an increase in orders of 0.3% for the month, according to Reuters. Year over year, factory orders were up 3.8%.The month-to-month dip may have been driven ...

By Lauren Muskett • March 19, 2019

Norsk Hydro Hit by Extensive Cyberattack

Norsk Hydro, one of the largest producers of aluminum in the world, said it was working to contain a cyberattack that impacted operations “in several of the company’s business areas,” sending shares in the company down 3.4% in early trading.Shares recovered partially by midmorning.The news also s...

By Lauren Muskett • March 19, 2019

A University CFO Stretches His Wings

Whatever pressures corporate CFOs face today, finance chiefs at colleges and universities may have it just as bad — if not worse.Aside from pure financial pressures, which both groups of CFOs grapple with, many of those at educational institutions find themselves in an existential battle.Harvard ...

By David McCann • March 18, 2019

Cyber Breaches Lead to Cutbacks in Dividends and R&D Spending

Not many institutional investors question an issuer’s approach to cybersecurity, but maybe they should.After a cyber breach, companies are likely to suffer only a short-term hit to their share prices, according to a new study. But in the long run, they typically pay lower dividends and invest les...

By Vincent Ryan • March 18, 2019

Rep. Waters: Pay Raise for Wells Fargo CEO ‘Outrageous’

Congresswoman Maxine Waters, chair of the financial services committee in the House of Representatives, called for the chief executive officer of Wells Fargo to be fired after the bank revealed he received a substantial pay increase in 2018.In a regulatory filing on Wednesday, the embattled finan...

By Vincent Ryan • March 15, 2019

Hong Kong Bans UBS Sponsor License, Fines It $48 Million

The Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) of Hong Kong has banned Swiss bank UBS from leading initial public offerings in the city for one year. It also fined the bank $48 million for maintaining improper listing standards.UBS is the first major bank involved in stock listings to be suspended a...

By Lauren Muskett • March 14, 2019

Rite Aid Execs Depart in Sweeping Restructuring

Rite Aid announced that its CEO John Standley was leaving the company along with CFO Darren Karst and COO Kermit Crawford as part of a sweeping restructuring.In a statement, the company said it was cutting about 400 corporate positions, which is about 20% of corporate jobs, in both its headquarte...

By Lauren Muskett • March 13, 2019

MoviePass Owner Says Q3 Revenue Overstated

The owner of MoviePass restated its financial results for the third quarter of 2018, saying it had incorrectly recognized $6.6 million in revenue from the struggling discount-ticketing service.In a regulatory filing, Helios & Matheson Analytics Inc. disclosed that it had overstated MoviePass ...

By Matthew Heller • March 12, 2019

Avoiding Lulls in Business Transformation

One of the biggest problems CFOs and other leaders in the C-suite are challenged with during business transformation is keeping the momentum going through an implementation.When a new project starts, there is usually excitement during the strategy and innovation phases. You get your implementatio...

By Lauren Muskett • March 12, 2019

IEA: U.S. to Drive Oil Supply Growth

U.S. crude oil exports will nearly double to 9 million barrels per day by 2024, surpassing shipments from Russia and nearly catching up to Saudi Arabia, currently the world’s largest oil exporter, the International Energy Agency (IEA) forecasted.The agency said it expected the U.S. to add another...

By Lauren Muskett • March 11, 2019

DOL Proposes Expanding Overtime

The Labor Department has proposed raising the threshold under which workers are entitled to mandatory overtime pay, whenever their workweek exceeds 40 hours, to $35,308.Under current rules, the threshold is $23,660 a year. The change would extend overtime eligibility to 1.1 million additional wor...

By Lauren Muskett • March 8, 2019

Use Tax Time to Decrease Your International Business Risk

Rather than just a box-checking exercise, tax reporting should be treated as an annual chance to ask high impact questions of your global business and to help you come to smarter strategic decisions. Your team is going to be gathering the information anyway, so why not use it in a more systema...

By Lou Longo • March 8, 2019

CFOs on the Move: Week Ending March 8

National Geographic Partners, a joint venture between National Geographic and 21stCentury Fox, appointed Akilesh Sridharan finance chief. He previously was senior vice president of corporate development and strategy for Fox Networks Group.Ravi Ahuja Ravi Ahuja will head finance at Disney Televisi...

By Joan Urdang • March 8, 2019

The Two-Step Process for Achieving Agility

The marketplace rewards agility. Likewise, it punishes companies that are too slow and myopic to see what’s coming and to act before they suffer serious consequences. In an era where tomorrow may not look anything like today, agility may well be the defining characteristic of success.Some in the ...

By Jim Bell • March 7, 2019

Don’t Lose Sight of Value

It is the CFO’s responsibility to ensure that a project starts only after adequate analysis of delivered value. Because part of the CFO role is to bridge numbers and value, a CFO that loses sight of value gives up control and can create a serious power imbalance that may damage the relationship w...

By Lauren Muskett • March 5, 2019

Metric of the Month: Number of Accounts in the Chart of Accounts

APQC is currently in the middle of transitioning to a new ERP system. In my role as CFO, the most challenging part of this project by far has been cleaning up our chart of accounts as we make the move. With more than 5,000 accounts, our chart of accounts has gotten incredibly bloated over the yea...

By Perry D. Wiggins • March 4, 2019

SEC Names Gabriel Benincasa as First Chief Risk Officer

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced it has named Gabriel Benincasa as chief risk officer, a position created by Chairman Jay Clayton to strengthen the SEC’s risk management and cybersecurity efforts. Benincasa is the first person to hold the position.In a statement, the SEC said...

By Lauren Muskett • March 1, 2019