Posts Tagged ‘financial reporting’
An SEC Statement on Restatements
The top accountant at the Securities and Exchange Commission wants corporate executives and audit committees to do better at evaluating when financial restatements are necessary, saying that too many tilt their analysis toward the conclusion that, nope, that error we had last quarter doesn’t need to be restated after all. Paul Munter, the SEC’s acting…
Read MoreSEC Hints on Financial Reporting Future
Some red meat today for all the financial reporting diehards out there: the top accountant at the Securities and Exchange Commission has issued a statement sharing his thoughts about the Financial Accounting Standards Board’s plans for the future. FASB, the nonprofit group that sets U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles, published an “invitation to comment” last…
Read MoreSEC Springs Warning on Option Grants
The Securities and Exchange Commission is warning companies to do better at estimating and reporting the value of “spring-loaded” stock option grants they give to executives, possibly as a prelude to future enforcement actions against companies that continue to ignore the tricky accounting challenges involved here. Spring-loaded stock option grants are equity awards that companies…
Read MoreBitcoin, We Have a Problem
I have tried my best for years to avoid this subject, but the time has come at last. Compliance officers, we need to talk about bitcoin. Specifically, we need to talk about certain operating businesses in the world that now purchase and hold bitcoin as a corporate strategy. Because some companies are doing exactly that,…
Read MorePCAOB Previews Inspection Focus
The PCAOB plans to shake up how it will inspect audit firms this year, with a specific focus on how the pandemic has challenged financial reporting and audit risks and a promise to “reduce the predictability” of this year’s inspections. The agency published a staff alert on Tuesday outlining its priorities for 2021 inspections, so…
Read MoreSEC Talks Covid Disclosures
Just in time for the end of second quarter, the Securities and Exchange Commission has published another dollop of guidance about financial disclosures companies should keep in mind as they navigate Covid-19. The statement came Tuesday from chief accountant Sagar Teotia. It’s the latest in a series of pronouncements SEC officials have made since early…
Read MoreRelief on Covid-19 Lease Accounting Burdens
Good news for financial reporting and corporate disclosure folks: the Financial Accounting Standards Board says companies do not need to go through a potentially mind-numbing examination of how the accounting for operating leases might change due to Covid-19. The guidance came from FASB on Friday. It says that companies do not need to account for…
Read MoreDispatches From FEI 2019 Conference
Financial Executives International is hosting its annual Corporate Financial Reporting Insights conference in New York this week, a who’s who of financial reporting regulators, executives, and other thought leaders. Radical Compliance couldn’t attend FEI in person this year, so as usual, we’ve collected a bundle of dispatches from social media to call out interesting points…
Read MoreA Better Understanding of Estimates
Last month the PCAOB published fresh guidance on how to audit accounting estimates. Today let’s take a deeper look at what that guidance says, because the principles it recommends can be quite useful for compliance and risk officers too. To begin with the obvious: Yes, this guidance is written for audit firms that are inspecting…
Read MoreNew PCAOB Guidance on Estimates, Specialists
Heads up, audit professionals: the PCAOB has released fresh guidance on how to audit accounting estimates and how to use specialists in complex audit work — two issues that are the subject of new audit standards going into effect in 2021. Each subject has two pieces of staff guidance, so that’s four PDFs for you…
Read More