SEC Chair: Audit Quality Improving Since SOX

Investor confidence in audited financial statements and independent auditors is “high,” but there are still too many cases of companies and their auditors failing to fulfill their obligations adequately, according to U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Mary Jo White.In a speech Wednesda...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 10, 2015

Capital Allocation Principles Stand the Test of Time

Even a great company can’t thrive long-term if it’s growing expenses faster than revenue.At Intuit, that means we focus intensely on how we allocate capital. It’s one of four fundamental financial principles, which include:Grow revenue organically at double digitsGrow revenue faster than expenses...

By Neil Williams • Dec. 10, 2015

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

Walmart Launches Smartphone App for Paying at Register

Walmart on Thursday introduced Walmart Pay — the ability to pay at the register with smartphones.The new Walmart app works with any iOS or Android device that can download it, and with any major credit, debit, prepaid, or Walmart gift card. Customers can scan a QR code displayed at the register w...

By Katie Kuehner-Hebert • Dec. 10, 2015

French Ad Agency Publicis Loses $54M Account

Just days after unveiling a companywide reorganization aimed at improving sluggish growth and helping it win more business, French advertising agency Publicis said it has lost Procter & Gamble’s media planning and buying account in North America.P&G is shifting the bulk of the account to ...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 9, 2015

Yahoo Shelves Plan to Spin off Alibaba Stake

Yahoo said Wednesday it was suspending plans to spin off its $23 billion stake in Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group largely because of tax considerations and instead would focus on a reverse spinoff.Yahoo’s assets and liabilities other than the Alibaba stake would be transferred to a newly f...

By Katie Kuehner-Hebert • Dec. 9, 2015

Why Data Needs a Seat at the Corporate Table

CEOs often assert that people are a company’s most important asset. But people are more aptly characterized as resources, not assets.Craig Calle In fact, at many companies data is the most important asset. It even gets recorded, intangible as it is, on the balance sheet. Often it is data assets t...

By Craig Callé • Dec. 9, 2015

Is Verizon Interested in Yahoo Internet Businesses?

Verizon Communications may consider buying Yahoo’s core business, which includes Yahoo Mail, its news and sports sites, and its advertising technology, Verizon CFO Fran Shammo said on Monday.“If we see there is a strategic fit and it makes sense for our shareholders and we can return value, we’ll...

By Katie Kuehner-Hebert • Dec. 8, 2015

Why Tax Planning Should Be Melded with Strategy

With the increased demand for transparency and more extensive financial reporting from public and private companies, many C-suite executives have paid closer attention to their companies’ tax functions. While attention has shifted to the tax function’s role as an important tool for maintaining re...

By Jill Kelley and Mitchell R. Kops • Dec. 8, 2015

Miner Anglo American to Dump Assets, Slash Workforce

Bowing to the realities of the teetering mining industry, Anglo American on Tuesday announced that it will embark on a “radical portfolio restructuring” that will include slashing 85,000 of its 135,000 jobs and offloading three-fifths of its assets.The London-based global company, which has been ...

By Katie Kuehner-Hebert • Dec. 8, 2015

Amazon Stock to Keep Surging after Banner 2015: Analysts

Retail “disrupter” Amazon is on fire, and its stock could jump 19% next year after more than doubling during 2015, according to analysts at Pacific Crest, which started covering the company’s stock this week.“Amazon continues to innovate at a high rate, and we believe it is embedding itself into ...

By Katie Kuehner-Hebert • Dec. 8, 2015

EU’s Financial Transactions Tax Moves Ahead

Ten European Union countries have reached a tentative agreement on some aspects of a much-delayed tax on financial transactions but left some issues, including the rate of the tax, unresolved.The European Commission first proposed a financial transactions tax (FTT) in 2011 to recover some of the ...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 8, 2015

Analyst Questions Petrobras’ Hedge Accounting

Petrobras, Brazil’s national oil company, may soon have to pay the piper for using hedge accounting to limit the impact of exchange rate variations on its dollar-denominated debt, according to a Wall Street analyst.Starting in May 2013, Petrobras set aside about 20% of export proceeds in a specia...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 8, 2015

Collaborative Workplaces Can Cut Costs

When they seek ways to improve productivity, companies often miss one very helpful tactic: Looking around. Literally. Take a moment to think about your current office space. It’s likely that the way you work has changed significantly since it was designed years, if not decades, ago.Gary Crowe, CF...

By Gary Crowe • Dec. 7, 2015

Deadline Looms for ‘Tax Extenders’ Package

The “Cadillac” tax provision of the Affordable Care Act and tax breaks for low-income working families are among the issues in a broad “tax extenders” bill that lawmakers in Congress are working to resolve by the end of the year.The bill would makes expired and expiring tax breaks permanent, but ...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 7, 2015

CFO Strategy and C-Suite Success

As businesses face future challenges, such as those involving cyber security, developing and retaining talent, big data analytics, new technologies, and mobile platforms, they have two choices. Capitalize on the opportunities, or plateau and crumble. If companies can see –and, likewise, get their...

By Kerry Maruna • Dec. 7, 2015

eBay Urges Sellers To Help Fight Sales Tax Bills

eBay is hoping to enlist the sellers who use its online platform to help the company prevent Congress from enacting Internet sales tax legislation.In an email sent to sellers on Friday, eBay said the Marketplace Fairness Act (MFA) and its companion, the Remote Transactions Parity Act (RTPA), woul...

By Katie Kuehner-Hebert • Dec. 7, 2015

Clinton to Propose Crackdown on Inversions

Hillary Clinton is targeting corporate inversion deals with a proposal to impose an “exit tax” on U.S. companies that merge with corporations overseas to lower their tax liability.According to the Associated Press, Clinton’s presidential campaign will unveil the proposal Wednesday “as part of a b...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 7, 2015

Metric of the Month: How Finance People Spend Their Time

It’s 9 a.m. Do you know where your finance people are? Or more importantly, do you know how they are spending their time?In a recent assessment of 832 companies’ finance organizations using data from APQC’s Open Standards Benchmarking database, APQC, the Houston-based research firm I work for, fo...

By Mary C. Driscoll • Dec. 4, 2015

Grant Thornton Put Auditor’s Career Above Investor Interests

By allowing a poorly rated partner to continue auditing a public company without sufficient supervision and oversight, “Grant Thornton prioritized the career of its partner and the retention of that partner’s clients over the interest of investors, with serious negative consequences,” Andrew J. C...

By David Katz • Dec. 3, 2015

The Value of Collaboration [Infographic]

By Mary Beth Findlay • Dec. 3, 2015

Consumer Industries See Automation and Digitalization as Key to Success

The future looks bright for a career in finance, according to a recent CFO Research survey of 202 finance professionals in the consumer industries around the world, but the effective use of technology will enable much of that success. The survey, sponsored by SAP, sought to gain a better understa...

By Mary Beth Findlay • Dec. 3, 2015

Target to Pay $39M to Settle Data-Breach Claims

Target has reached another settlement of claims related to a massive data breach, agreeing to pay $39.4 million to MasterCard and other U.S. financial institutions.The breach exposed 40 million credit and debit cards to fraud during the 2013 holiday season. Target was sued by banks and card issue...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 2, 2015

Finance Roundup for Executives

What’s Going on in Finance from CFO The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced Tuesday it had charged a Vermont man and two of his companies with conducting a Ponzi scheme involving the system for validating digital currency transactions. The events “had many of the hallmarks of a Ponz...

By Kerry Maruna • Dec. 2, 2015

Finance Roundup for Executives

Here’s What’s Going on in Finance from CFO Cyber Monday shopping hit higher numbers this year than ever before ($3B). With online deals beginning as far back as Thanksgiving day, will Cyber Monday soon be known as Cyber Week? What are people spending all that money on anyways? Find out here.A for...

By Kerry Maruna • Dec. 1, 2015

Standard Bank to Pay $32M in Bribery Case

ICBC Standard Bank Plc has agreed to pay nearly $37 million to settle U.S. and U.K. charges relating to a bribery scandal over a $600-million Tanzania government-bond deal.Under a first-of-its-kind deferred prosecution agreement with the U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office (SFO), the bank admitted it fai...

By Matthew Heller • Dec. 1, 2015