Activist Hedge Fund Slams CSX

The manager of a large, activist hedge fund is putting the heat on railroad company CSX Corp., calling for a broad slate of new corporate governance practices and better business performance. The Children’s Investment Master Fund, founded and run by the secretive Chris Hohn, made public a letter...

By Stephen Taub • Oct. 16, 2007

Credit Not so Tough to Get, Small Businesses Say

Credit crunch? What credit crunch? According to a new survey by PNC Financial Services Group, 87 percent of small and mid-sized business owners who need credit say availability is the same or better than three months ago.And these business owners apparently are not skittish about unloading the m...

By Stephen Taub • Oct. 4, 2007

Explore the Trendline➔

Tax policy shifts: What CFOs need to know to stay ahead

Discover how evolving tax policies are creating new opportunities and challenges for CFOs.

By CFO.com staff

China: Not So Blue

For the first time, CFO Europe’s latest quarterly Business Outlook Survey includes a dedicated poll of finance chiefs in China. Gauging the sentiment of 380 CFOs, the survey finds senior finance executives in the country in a good mood, relatively speaking.More than 40% of China-based CFOs say th...

By Jason Karaian • Oct. 1, 2007

ROI of Humans

In a Harvard Business Review paper in the early 1990s, Peter Drucker, the most influential management thinker of the last century, wrote, “It is the individual, and especially the skilled and knowledgeable employee, who decides in large measure what he or she will contribute to the organisation a...

By Laura Cameron • Oct. 1, 2007

Business Outlook Survey

CFO optimism plunged to a six-year low in this quarter’s Duke University/CFO magazine Business Outlook Survey, with a record 62 percent of U.S. finance executives saying they felt more pessimistic about the economy than last quarter. Ongoing worries about consumer demand and the cost of labor, co...

By Kate O'Sullivan • Oct. 1, 2007

View from China: What Price Glory?

Exactly one year before the start of the Beijing Summer Olympics, which begin on the auspicious date of August 8, 2008 (the Chinese regard eight as a lucky number, and a triple eight compounds its value), state media is dominated by reports of how excited the Chinese people are about hosting this...

By Wu Chen • Oct. 1, 2007

If You Build It, Will They Come?

When the towering Shanghai World Financial Center is completed next year, it will not only rank among the world’s tallest skyscrapers but will also embody Shanghai’s bid to become a major financial center. (Indeed, the smoke pouring from the building during a mid-August fire could have been read ...

By Alan Rappeport • Oct. 1, 2007

Go with the Flow

Read the complete results of the 2007 Cash Masters survey, or review just those results that appeared in print.Life often imitates art. Given the recent twists and turns at his company, Lothar Lanz, for example, can easily relate to the soap operas broadcast on television channels owned by ProSie...

By Jason Karaian • Oct. 1, 2007

Business Outlook Survey

For weeks, debate has raged over whether the credit crunch gripping banks, hedge funds and private equity firms will spread to the global economy. In a recent research note, State Street’s Andrew Capon made his opinion clear: “Those that believe this will have no impact on the real economy are wh...

By Jason Karaian • Oct. 1, 2007

High Maintenance

What is it about joint ventures in China? They’re hard to set up, difficult to manage, and almost impossible to unwind if things go wrong. Just ask Emmanuel Faber, the former CFO of French yogurt and water company Danone, which has been running dozens of JVs with China’s largest beverage company,...

By Janet Kersnar • Oct. 1, 2007

SEC’s Small Biz Proposals Criticized

Participants in a Securities and Exchange Commission roundtable criticized proposed rule changes that the SEC claims would make it easier for small companies to raise capital. Earlier this year, the SEC proposed adjustments to several rules under Regulation D, a 25-year-old guideline used to dete...

By Sarah Johnson • Sept. 24, 2007

There’s Risky Business Abroad

An international assignment may feel like a holiday for jet-setting business travelers, but for the company sending them it can be a pure risk-management headache.Concerns over taxes and compliance with immigration regulations — not to mention more mundane worries about illness, injury, and other...

By Alan Rappeport • Sept. 18, 2007

Grand Theft Auto, for Real

The former chief financial officer of a luxury-car dealership in Florida has been charged with embezzling more than $500,000 during a five-year period. Andrew Casale, onetime CFO of Reeves Import Motor Cars, was arrested at his home on Thursday morning and charged with six counts of second-degree...

By Marie Leone • Sept. 14, 2007

Alcoa Gets China Payback

Alcoa Inc. sold its holding in Aluminum Corp. of China Ltd. (Chalco) for about $2 billion as part of a plan to redeploy its Asian assets, capitalizing on a rapid rise in the value of Chalco shares since its 2001 initial public offering.The Pittsburgh-based aluminum giant, which was outbid earlier...

By Roy Harris • Sept. 12, 2007

CFOs’ Optimism Plummets to Six-Year Low

CFOs’ optimism about the U.S. economy has taken a nosedive. In fact, it has sunk to the lowest level on record, according to the latest results of the quarterly Duke University/CFO Business Outlook Survey.Nearly two-thirds of CFOs are feeling more pessimistic this quarter than they did three mont...

By Sarah Johnson • Sept. 11, 2007

Small Biz Owners Feeling a Squeeze

Small business owners were less upbeat in July than they were at the beginning of the prior quarter, according to the latest quarterly Wells Fargo/Gallup Small Business Index.The index, the sum of both current and future perceptions, is based on telephone interviews with 603 small business owners...

By Stephen Taub • Sept. 6, 2007

At Your Beck and Call

Tired of doctors’ visits that consist of waiting 45 minutes for a hurried 5-minute conversation? Try the boutique alternative. Also called concierge care or membership-based coverage, these services are becoming increasingly popular despite their high cost.The idea is to charge consumers as much ...

By Lori Calabro • Sept. 1, 2007

Thank You for Smoking

Despite efforts to convince the ethical investment industry that they conduct their businesses “responsibly,” tobacco companies are universally excluded from ethical funds. Not that this has any effect on their financial performance. Bolstered by volume growth in emerging markets and pricing powe...

By Jason Karaian • Sept. 1, 2007

2050 Foresight

Just for fun, let’s turn away from the troubles of the present — the meltdown of the subprime mortgage sector, the volatility of the stock market, the cratering of hedge funds — and look to the horizon. What is the world going to look like in 2050?The growing consensus is that we will be in the m...

By Edward Teach • Sept. 1, 2007

View from Europe: The French Disconnection

You couldn’t help but be puzzled by the timing. Just as France’s new finance minister, Christine Lagarde, called on the nation to “stop thinking, start working” in a July speech, her countrymen were packing their bags to begin their annual summer holidays. Both working and thinking would have to ...

By Janet Kersnar • Sept. 1, 2007

What’s Your Fraud Score?

A new research report contains formulas to help auditors and investors predict the likelihood that a public company is playing earnings management games. Sponsored by the Big Four accounting firms, the report, “Predicting Material Accounting Manipulations,” explains how to calculate a “fraud scor...

By Marie Leone • Aug. 17, 2007

Sun Sets on More Jobs

Sun Microsystems said it will reduce its workforce, enabling it to save $100 million to $150 million over the next several quarters. However, it did not provide the exact number of positions it plans to eliminate. Since June 2006, Sun has cut about 4,000 jobs through layoffs and attrition. Sun ha...

By Stephen Taub • Aug. 8, 2007

Lessons in Sitting Pretty

This article has been updated to reflect a correction regarding the tax treatment of non-qualified stock options.Stock options are like sex, says Beth Walker, founder of financial-planning firm Virtual CFO and author of An Employee’s Guide to Stock Options. “Everybody wants some, everybody claims...

By Marie Leone • Aug. 1, 2007

View from Asia: How to Manage Terrorism

Head for any one of the pricey business hotels in Jakarta, and you’ll feel like you’re entering Iraq’s Green Zone. Entrances have more than one barricade and guards poke around in the taxi trunks. Soldiers are everywhere.Yet Indonesia can be called one of the world’s success stories in containing...

By Tom Leander • Aug. 1, 2007

Midair Maneuvers

Lasse Heinonen, CFO of Finnair, is well aware of the €2 billion airline’s competitive advantage: from its hub in Helsinki, Finnair offers a travel time to northeast Asia faster than any other European airline. But like most medium-sized European flag carriers, old obstacles had prevented him from...

By Eila Rana • July 30, 2007