Shaw Waits for SEC’s Accounting Decison

Prompted by comments from the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Shaw Group said it will restate several items in its 2006 annual report, including revisions to its cash flow statement and revenue classifications. In addition, the company said it is currently in discussions with the regulato...

By Stephen Taub • Aug. 1, 2007

A Wild Ride

Speed. It’s about speed. That may seem ridiculously obvious — like saying the sun is a tad on the warm side. But to witness up close how cars accelerate out of a turn, their 800-HP engines thundering, the g-forces pinning drivers to their seats as they streak past the grandstand, is to understand...

By John Goff • Aug. 1, 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

Senate Debates Tax for Private Equity, Hedge Funds

Senators probed private fund managers and tax experts Tuesday to determine the need for a controversial tax hike for hedge funds and private equity firms. Proposed legislation would force managers of private funds to pay the same tax rate that corporations and individuals pay on income.At issue i...

By Alan Rappeport • July 31, 2007

PCAOB Audit of Deloitte Causes Restatement, Again

Another client of Deloitte & Touche has announced the need to restate at least three years’ worth of financial statements to address incorrect accounting for interest-rate swaps. In both cases, the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board found the error during its inspection of the audit fi...

By Sarah Johnson • July 31, 2007

Licensing Deals Bedevil Aspen

The Securities and Exchange Commission charged Aspen Technology Inc. with inflating revenue over a three-year period in an attempt to meet analyst expectations. In addition, the regulator alleged that Aspen’s former senior management was directly involved in negotiating and improperly recognizing...

By Stephen Taub • July 31, 2007

Cox Defends XBRL to Senators

The Securities and Exchange Commission’s push for the expanded use of technology that makes financial reports interactive will get a critical test at the end of next year’s first quarter. In fact, “2008 will be a no or go year” for the future use of extensible business reporting language, said SE...

By Sarah Johnson • July 31, 2007

i2 CEO Unexpectedly Resigns

Michael E. McGrath has resigned as president and chief executive officer of i2 Technologies Inc., effective July 30. McGrath, 57, says he is seeking other opportunities, according to a regulatory filing. The supply chain management consulting company announced in May that McGrath was expected to ...

By Stephen Taub • July 31, 2007

IRS Snags Small Biz CFO

While finance executives involved in big white-collar crime cases make headlines, the Internal Revenue Service remains vigilant about tracking perpetrators of small-business crime. Case in point: Jeffrey Meyer, a one-time chief financial officer of a very small, defunct Illinois company has been ...

By Stephen Taub • July 30, 2007

Fuel Systems Solutions Ponders Restating

Fuel Systems Solutions warned that it will probably restate prior results to recognize non-cash charges for stock-based compensation expense.The Santa Ana, Calif.-based alternative fuels company said the revisions would cover the 2001 to 2005 fiscal years, and each quarter in fiscal years 2004 an...

By Stephen Taub • July 30, 2007

PSEG to Correct Accounting Error

Public Service Enterprise Group Inc. said it will restate its first quarter financial statements due to an accounting error at one of its wholly owned subsidiaries.The Newark, N.J.-based utility giant said the unit, PSEG Energy Holdings, determined that $207 million of its senior notes due in Feb...

By Stephen Taub • July 30, 2007

Prodded by Congress, Cox Finds Flexibility in FAS 140

In theory, once a lender securitizes a loan, it stays off the lender’s books, and its terms may not be changed. But as the subprime mortgage market has tumbled, regulators and Congress have interpreted the accounting rule that governs securitizations to provide a certain degree of flexibility. Th...

By Alan Rappeport • July 27, 2007

PCAOB: KPMG Fell Behind on Testing

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board has released the results of its 2006 inspection of KPMG and has cited the accounting firm for 14 audit deficiencies. The faults occurred at seven of KPMG’s clients and included failures to identify accounting errors and material weaknesses in internal...

By Sarah Johnson • July 27, 2007

Smurfit-Stone Corrects Tax Errors

Smurfit-Stone Container says it restated results in the second quarter to correct errors in how it calculated its income taxes.The company determined that $28 million in net benefits from income taxes previously recognized on noncash foreign currency translation losses from 2000 to 2006 should no...

By Stephen Taub • July 27, 2007

Scheme Breathes Life Back into Options

The Securities and Exchange Commission has filed civil fraud charges against Robert J. Therrien, former president and CEO of software maker Brooks Automation, alleging that he received millions of dollars in undisclosed compensation by fraudulently backdating the exercise of an option to purchase...

By Stephen Taub • July 26, 2007

Hedge Accounting: a Shortcut to a Shortcut?

Seeking to simplify an earlier stab at simplifying the accounting for interest-rate swaps, the Financial Accounting Standards Board earlier this week issued proposed guidelines about how users of the swaps can apply the “shortcut” method of booking them.Adopted in 1998 as part of FAS 133,“Account...

By David Katz • July 26, 2007

KLA-Tencor Charged with Backdating

The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged that KLA-Tencor Corp., and its former chief executive officer, were involved in an illegal scheme to backdate stock option grants. The company agreed to settle the charges.The SEC charged that since 1997, the semiconductor equipment company conce...

By Stephen Taub • July 26, 2007

Former SafeNet CFO Faces Fraud Charges

The former chief financial officer of SafeNet has been charged with securities fraud and conspiracy for backdating of millions of dollars’ worth of employee stock options grants. Carole Argo faces a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison, and a maximum fine on each count of the greater of $250,00...

By Stephen Taub • July 26, 2007

Bill-and-Hold Moves Stall Diebold Report

Diebold Inc. will delay the release of its second-quarter earnings results and the conference call explaining them because of questions that the Securities and Exchange Commission has raised concerning the company’s accounting for bill-and-hold revenue. Diebold reported that it has decided to see...

By Stephen Taub • July 25, 2007

SEC Okays Controls Rule, Pledges to Eye Auditors

The Securities and Exchange Commission has adopted a new auditing rule to replace the standard largely blamed for the costly and excessive work that arose out of the internal-controls provision of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. At the same time, the SEC staff promised to closely monitor how auditors put...

By Sarah Johnson • July 25, 2007

Got Bilked?

The former CFO and CEO of Parmalat were among nearly two dozen individuals indicted Wednesday by an Italian judge for their role in Europe’s largest corporate bankruptcy, according to the Associated Press.Fausto Tonna, the former finance executive, founder Calisto Tanzi and other former company e...

By Stephen Taub • July 25, 2007

ConAgra Settles with SEC for $45 Million

ConAgra Foods has agreed to pay $45 million to settle civil charges that in engaged in improper and fraudulent accounting practices.The SEC accused the food company of misusing corporate reserves to manipulate reported earnings in fiscal 1999 and engaging in a scheme at its former subsidiary, Uni...

By Stephen Taub • July 25, 2007

Will Foreign Accounting Standards Fly Here?

Should U.S. companies be allowed to use international financial reporting standards? It’s a question the Securities and Exchange Commission — prompted by the growing use of IFRS by other countries — will formally pose over the next three months. On Wednesday, the SEC commissioners agreed to relea...

By Sarah Johnson • July 25, 2007

PCAOB Review of Deloitte Prompts Restatement

Tenneco Inc. will restate three years’ worth of financial statements following the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board’s inspection of its external audit firm, Deloitte & Touche. When the PCAOB reviewed Deloitte’s audit of Tenneco’s financials, the oversight board found that the manufac...

By Stephen Taub • July 24, 2007

Paulson Targets Business-Tax Trauma

Adding another platform to the ones he has taken recently on accounting, auditing, and the state of capital markets, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson will lead a Thursday panel in Washington tackling the inequities and competitive disadvantages caused by America’s system of business taxes.Announ...

By Roy Harris • July 24, 2007

If It’s Tuesday, This Must Be. . .

Data-entry errors, subcontractor snafus, three-day lags in “real-time”Web tracking systems, and the occasional head-scratcher as to where in theworld a given place actually is — such were the perils and pitfalls of the annual“Great Package Race.”Part logistics competition, part rite-of-spring for...

By Vincent Ryan • July 24, 2007