Motive Inc. Restates, Looks for Auditor

Motive Inc. filed restated but unaudited results dating back to 2001 to correct revenue recognition errors.As a result, the small Austin, Tex.-based provider of management software for broadband and mobile data services reduced revenue by $21 million over a four-year period. The company stressed,...

By Stephen Taub • Sept. 5, 2007

Saks Settles SEC Vendor-Allowance Suit

Saks Inc. has settled Securities and Exchange Commission charges that some of the retailer’s employees practiced deception in order to meet the retailer’s “aggressive” earnings targets.From the mid-1990s until 2003, employees of the department store operator’s Saks Fifth Avenue Enterprises divisi...

By Stephen Taub • Sept. 5, 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

Did Fake Purchase Orders Lead to CFO’s Ouster?

What’s in a name? Irony, in the case of International Rectifier. The company, which has been struggling with a series of accounting problems, announced just before the Labor Day weekend that most of the problems it needs to rectify are, in fact, international, and at least partly the result of fa...

By Sarah Johnson • Sept. 4, 2007

Deloitte Forecloses on NovaStar Stock Offerings

In another blow to the already reeling sub-prime industry, NovaStar Financial’s efforts to sell some $150 million in preferred stock were torpedoed by Deloitte & Touche. Alarmed by the impact of the subprime meltdown on NovaStar, the auditor refused to participate in the preferred stock sales...

By Stephen Taub • Sept. 4, 2007

El Paso More Than Doubles NOL Estimate

El Paso Corp. more than doubled its original estimate of its net operating loss carry forward for taxes for year-end 2007.The energy company Tuesday said in a regulatory filing that the new estimate is $2.4 billion, significantly greater than the prior estimate of $1 billion that was provided at ...

By Stephen Taub • Sept. 4, 2007

Back to the Big Eight?

In the 1980s, eight firms dominated public accounting. Mergers reduced them to the Big Six, then the Big Five. The demise of Arthur Andersen ushered in the era of the Big Four. Throughout this period the so-called second-tier firms struggled to catch up, but there was always a clear divide betwee...

By Kate O'Sullivan • Sept. 1, 2007

Chinese Checking

Is it really worth it? From tainted pet food, seafood, and toothpaste to unraveling tires, exploding cell-phone batteries, and lead-painted children’s toys, defective products from China are giving U.S. companies second thoughts about the benefits of China’s low-cost manufacturing.In August, Matt...

By Russ Banham • Sept. 1, 2007

The Uncertainty Principles

“Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants,” Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis famously said. But that was in 1914, at least a quarter of a century before the invention of sunblock and a growing awareness that too much sunlight can, in fact, be harmful. When “sunlight” is trotted out no...

By Art Detman • Sept. 1, 2007

Shaw Restates over Westinghouse Investment

The Shaw Group has filed its restated results for the first fiscal quarter ended November 2006. Its restated results include items that reduced previously reported pretax income totaling $5.3 million — $3.4 million after tax.The engineering and construction company announced last April that it ha...

By Stephen Taub • Aug. 31, 2007

CEO Put on Leave Following Audit

In the middle of an investigation into accounting irregularities at a foreign subsidiary, International Rectifier has asked CEO Alex Lidow to take a leave of absence with pay. Lidow’s departure was announced Thursday, nearly two months after CFO Michael McGee was fired.Lidow, whose father founded...

By Sarah Johnson • Aug. 31, 2007

Undisclosed Uncollectibles Force SEC Settlement

The Securities and Exchange Commission has settled civil charges against an electrical-contracting company and seven former officers and employees for engaging in a number of disclosure and accounting violations in 2003 and 2004.The commission alleged that over the course of four consecutive quar...

By Stephen Taub • Aug. 31, 2007

The 2007 Latin America Working Capital Survey

click here to view the complete survey resultsDespite healthy economic growth in Latin America, companies there saw a slump in their working capital performance in 2006, according to a new survey by the REL Consultancy Group and CFO.Reviewing Latin America’s 100 largest public companies, the surv...

By Alan Rappeport • Aug. 30, 2007

Auditor: Convergence Could Spur Revenue Wreck

The Securities and Exchange Commission’s proposal to stop requiring some foreign companies to reconcile their financials with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles has been touted as a way to keep those companies invested in the U.S. capital markets. By not having to pay for the reconcili...

By Sarah Johnson • Aug. 29, 2007

The 2007 Canada Working Capital Survey

Click here to download the complete survey results.Canada’s expanding economy and the growing reach of both sales and sourcing helped Canadian firms maintain their strong working capital performance in 2006, according to a new survey by the REL Consultancy Group and CFO.Reviewing Canada’s 100 lar...

By Alan Rappeport • Aug. 29, 2007

Selectica CEO, Its Ex-CFO, Is Ousted

Software company Selectica ousted board chairman and CEO Stephen Bennion, who it said “was aware of or involved with” stock-option backdating practices in his prior post as CFO. Bennion was made vice president and general manager, a post that “will not involve accounting or financial reporting re...

By Stephen Taub • Aug. 27, 2007

AFL-CIO Offers Big Four Advice on Backdating Abuse

Concerned that the recent epidemic of stock option abuses at U.S. corporations is far from over, the AFL-CIO sent letters of advice to the Big Four accounting firms in hopes that they can help prevent future wrongdoings.In the letters, sent last Friday to Ernst & Young, Deloitte & Touche,...

By Kate Plourd • Aug. 27, 2007

Senator Calls on Big Four to Fix Subprime Crisis

One month after Securities and Exchange Commission chairman Christopher Cox made it more economically feasible for lenders to modify securitized loans when a default seems likely, Sen. Charles Schumer is encouraging the Big Four accounting firms to ensure their clients are aware of the option. Sc...

By Sarah Johnson • Aug. 27, 2007

Vail Restates, Cutting Operating Cash Flow

Vail Resorts reported that it will restate parts of its financials for the first three fiscal quarters of 2007 to correct the way it classified real estate cash flows. The result? A cut in operating cash flow tied to real estate investment.The company, which owns ski resorts and luxury hotels, el...

By Stephen Taub • Aug. 27, 2007

Budget Office Sees Corporate-Tax Slowdown

After years of notable increases, the government’s revenue growth from corporate income taxes has significantly slowed this year and will continue to decline, according to the Congressional Budget Office.That forecast may sound promising to financial executives who feel their employers are overta...

By Sarah Johnson • Aug. 24, 2007

Deloitte Drops Company Shortly after IPO

Deloitte & Touche quit as BioFuel Energy Corp.’s audit firm earlier this week, leaving the newly public company without an auditor. The ethanol producer gave no reason for the auditor’s departure in a regulatory filing announcing the news.The Denver-based company has acknowledged, however, th...

By Sarah Johnson • Aug. 24, 2007

ESpeed Slows Down Revenue Recognition

In the process of merging with a Cantor Fitzgerald brokerage unit, eSpeed Inc. has taken a second look at how it accounts for revenues and costs involved in a joint services agreement. As a result, it will restate its financials from 1999 through 2006 and for the first quarter of this year. The a...

By Sarah Johnson • Aug. 22, 2007

Option Dating, and Theft, Lead to $30M Charge

Backdated stock options will force Wireless Facilities Inc. (WFI) to take a charge of between $30 million and $40 million, an internal review has concluded. Approximately $6.3 million of the amount relates to a fraud committed by the former stock options administrator, Vencent A. Donlan, the comp...

By Marie Leone • Aug. 20, 2007

Bad News Monday for LCC International

It was no surprise for officials at LCC International Inc to be formally notified Monday that Nasdaq is considering delisting the company’s stock because of its late regulatory filings — the company had announced in April that it would miss the filing deadline for its 2006 10-K. The company, whic...

By Marie Leone • Aug. 20, 2007

Kensey Nash Does Some Surgery on Itself

When a medical device company put the kibosh on one of its business ventures earlier this summer, it announced the decision as a cost-saving measure. But for now, the decision is costing Kensey Nash Corp. in severance outlays, contract-cancellation expenses, and material asset impairment charges ...

By Sarah Johnson • Aug. 20, 2007

GenTek Reports Cash-Accounting Slipup

GenTek Inc. will restate two quarterly reports to fix a classification error in its cash-flow statement. The company had been incorrectly accounting for capital expenditures on an accrual basis.The chemical company had delayed filing its financial statements for the second quarter, which were due...

By Sarah Johnson • Aug. 17, 2007