PCAOB Disapproves First Auditor

As of May 4, the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board had approved the registration applications of 840 accounting firms that wished to audit public companies. Last week, the accounting industry’s watchdog issued its first rejection.The PCAOB announced that it had disapproved the application...

By Stephen Taub • May 10, 2004

CA Restates Again, Delays Filings

Computer Associates International Inc. announced that it will revise previously filed quarterly reports by $9 million due to an adjustment in the way it calculates subscription revenue.The software giant, embroiled in an accounting scandal and on the heels of a major management shakeup, said it w...

By Stephen Taub • May 7, 2004

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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

PCAOB Targets Auditor Independence

The new regulator created to oversee the nation’s accounting profession plans to make the independence of auditors and their sale of tax shelters two key issues for its 2004 agenda, according to Reuters.The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board may ask its new standing advisory group to sched...

By Stephen Taub • May 7, 2004

KPMG Must Reveal Tax-Shelter Clients

KPMG lost a major battle in its tax shelter controversy.A federal judge has ruled that the Big Four accountancy must furnish the Internal Revenue Service with the names of participants in a number of shelters and must produce related documents, according to Reuters. The firm has 10 days to comply...

By Stephen Taub • May 6, 2004

Breathing Room for Stock-Option Proposal

William Donaldson, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, has told Congress that it should allow the Financial Accounting Standards Board to create the rules for expensing stock options, according to Bloomberg.“The process established by the FASB to consider the pending stock option ...

By Stephen Taub • May 6, 2004

Parading to Puerto Rico

In March, Tyco International Ltd. came under heavy criticism for its decision to maintain its incorporation in Bermuda. But some companies have discovered a locale that has tax advantages without the political pressure that comes with moving to non-U.S. tax havens: Puerto Rico.While Puerto Rico’s...

By John P. Mello Jr. • May 5, 2004

El Paso Probe Blames Some Employees

A probe initiated by El Paso Corp.’s audit committee found that certain employees committed accounting fraud over a five-year period, which eventually forced the company to substantially pare its proven reserves of oil and natural gas.In February — not long after Royal Dutch/Shell Group announced...

By Stephen Taub • May 4, 2004

It’s Better (and Worse) Than You Think

It’s been a long two-and-a-half years since Enron’s spectacular collapse. Arthur Andersen has vanished, other success stories of the 1990s have been exposed as frauds, and Congress has passed a big, expensive law to keep it all from happening again.Now, at long last, prospects are improving. Corp...

By Don Durfee • May 3, 2004

SEC Probes Bally; CFO Resigns, Returns

Chief financial officer and director John Dwyer resigned on Wednesday from gym chain Bally Total Fitness Holding Corp., as the Securities and Exchange Commission launched an investigation into the company’s recent restatement.On Thursday, Dwyer returned to Bally’s as a $475,000-a-year consultant,...

By Stephen Taub • April 30, 2004

Nortel Fires CEO, Top Finance Executives

Embroiled in an accounting scandal, Nortel Networks Corp. has fired its chief executive officer and two top finance executives and plans to restate 2003 earnings downward by 50 percent.The company replaced president and CEO Frank Dunn with William Owens, who has been a director of Nortel and NNL,...

By Stephen Taub • April 29, 2004

Oracle Finds Trouble in Denmark

An Oracle Corp. internal audit has revealed that costs pertaining to the latest fiscal year had not been booked, thus improving the company’s Danish results, according to Reuters.The wire service cited a story that ran Tuesday in Borsen, a Danish financial daily.Oracle confirmed the newspaper’s r...

By Stephen Taub • April 28, 2004

Computer Associates Restates $2.2 Billion

Amid a blizzard of announcements Monday morning, Computer Associates International Inc. reported that it will restate $2.2 billion of revenue over a two-year period. The company also named an interim chief executive officer and promoted its recently named chief financial officer.The software gian...

By Stephen Taub • April 27, 2004

Fencing with the West

It was a week of stark contrasts in the changing fortunes of East and West. On February 16, Robert Zoellick, the mustachioed chief trade negotiator of the United States, landed in dusty New Delhi with a mission—to convince India to break down its barriers so that more American goods could compete...

By Abe De Ramos • April 26, 2004

Despite Ban on New Clients, E&Y Hired

When is a suspension not a suspension? When it hasn’t gone into effect yet.That’s what Ernst & Young found last week, when Jos. A. Bank Clothiers replaced its auditor, KPMG, with E&Y. In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the company reported that the decision to make t...

By Stephen Taub • April 26, 2004

Calpers: Don’t Mix Audit, Non-Audit

Calpers announced that it will withhold votes for director nominees of at least seven companies, a week after the nation’s largest pension fund said it would send no-confidence messages to potential directors at 30 other businesses.Many of the announcements stem from a policy decision made halfwa...

By Stephen Taub • April 23, 2004

Greenspan Endorses Expensing Options

Federal Reserve Board chairman Alan Greenspan stated on Wednesday that he supports the Financial Accounting Standards Board’s proposal that corporations expense the value of stock options.In testimony to Congress’s Joint Economic Committee, Greenspan said that not expensing stock options gives a ...

By Stephen Taub • April 22, 2004

Goodyear’s Lenders Cut It Slack

Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. is slowly moving beyond its accounting scandal.The world’s largest tire maker announced that its lenders have amended the terms of its credit facilities to allow it until May 19 to file its 2003 annual report with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Goodyear is ...

By Stephen Taub • April 21, 2004

Royal Dutch/Shell Fires CFO Judy Boynton

The Royal Dutch/Shell Group has fired group chief financial officer Judy Boynton, the latest casualty in the controversy surrounding the oil giant.In addition, Shell once again reduced its figures for proven oil and gas reserves; announced that it will restate its financials for 2000 through 2003...

By Stephen Taub • April 20, 2004

Auditor Draws Six-Month New-Client Ban

A judge ruled that Ernst & Young cannot accept new audit clients in the United States for six months because it violated Securities and Exchange Commission rules on auditor independence, according to published reports.According to the commission, the accounting firm marketed consulting and ta...

By Stephen Taub • April 20, 2004

PCAOB Names Elite Advisory Group

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board created a standing advisory group and named 30 individuals to assist the board in carrying out its standards-setting responsibilities.While the PCAOB staff will draft the board’s standards, the new group will play a checks-and-balances role — and even...

By Stephen Taub • April 19, 2004

Accelerated Filers in the Slow Lane

Oneida is the latest of a growing number of companies seeking additional time to file their annual reports with the Securities and Exchange Commission.The maker of flatware and crystal announced it had determined that it must report information on a greater number of segments, as required by Stat...

By Stephen Taub • April 19, 2004

Strict Regimen for Troubled Food Giant

Dutch grocery group Royal Ahold NV, the world’s third-largest food retailer by sales, will repay debt and reorganize its finance function as it continues to recover from its billion-dollar accounting blow-up.Figuring prominently in the scandal was Ahold’s institutional-catering division U.S. Food...

By Dave Cook • April 16, 2004

Sports ”Revenue Managers” Scalp Fans

Many professional sports teams that once shook their finger at ticket scalpers are now apparently profiting from the practice themselves.Although 31 states have some variety of anti-scalping laws on the books, they were designed to rein in street sellers who gouged fans and, sometimes, passed cou...

By Dave Cook • April 14, 2004

Shell Faults Ex-Execs on Overbooking

A draft report by the audit committee for Royal Dutch/Shell Group plans to blame two former executives for overbooking reserves of oil and gas, but not to recommend further changes in top management, sources told The Wall Street Journal.In March, Royal Dutch/Shell ousted Sir Philip Watts, the gro...

By Dave Cook • April 13, 2004

Shell Replaces CFO of Troubled Unit

The Royal Dutch/Shell Group of Cos. announced that it replaced the chief financial officer of its exploration and production business. Earlier this year, that division revised downward its proven reserves of oil and natural gas by 20 percent.Frank Coopman “was offered a key alternative position i...

By Stephen Taub • April 9, 2004