Financial reporting

BDO Seidman said the firm’s national director of accounting, Ben Neuhausen, has passed away after a prolonged illness.

The push for a “lowest common denominator” set of international accounting standards, along with the failure of Sarbanes-Oxley reforms to curb last year’s financial meltdown, are among the factors contributing to the ongoing global recession, experts in corporate governance told Congress.

BDO Seidman said its revenue for the fiscal year ended June 30 fell 5.9 percent to $620 million from last year’s revenue of $659 million.

The Financial Crisis Advisory Group has published a report concluding that accounting standards are not to blame for the economic crisis.

IMGCAP(1)] As a new or young accountant there are a number of responsibilities and challenges on your plate.

Seven in ten Americans ages 45-74 say they plan to work in retirement or never retire, according to AARP. In stark contradiction to the single paradigm of “retirement” as an end to work, older Americans are redesigning the whole notion of life and work.

The task of making financial reporting simpler and more useful isn’t so simple as one might hope, according to several influential accounting officials who met to discuss the problem.

The International Accounting Standards Board has proposed changing the accounting standards for measuring and classifying financial instruments in response to concerns raised by the financial crisis.

Turmoil in the financial markets has negated the value of fair value accounting, according to more than half the respondents to a new survey.

IMGCAP(1)] Malik, a first-year African-American associate assignedto a major accounting firm’s California office, frets that he has blownhis one chance to make a good first impression:

The Financial Accounting Standards Board has added a new project to its agenda aimed at making financial disclosures more organized and less redundant.

Ever since we launched a redesigned Web site in late April, we’ve been eager to add new features and we can finally roll out the first major one.

Brown Smith Wallace said it has successfully completed all of its peer review examinations and received the best possible rating for its third consecutive review.

The Private Company Financial Reporting Committee met to discuss topics ranging from revenue recognition to FIN 48-d and loan-loss contingencies.

Financial Accounting Standards Board Chairman Robert Herz refuses to accept the inevitability of another financial system collapse.

A study by KPMG found that goodwill impairments more than doubled during 2008 from 2007 levels at a cross-section of U.S.-based public companies.

Credit-rating agency Fitch Ratings said in a new report that it does not expect FASB’s recent amendments to off-balance-sheet accounting standards to result in negative rating actions, but it believes there will be challenges for issuers and analysts in transitioning to the new standards.

Nine trade groups representing the financial, insurance, banking, real estate and other industries have united to create a coalition with the goal of influencing accounting standard-setters who are working on revising the rules for financial instruments.

New York’s new accountancy reform law, which goes into effect July 26, 2009, broadens the definition of the scope of practice of public accountancy to include all professional services provided by a CPA.

The Ohio Society of CPAs has launched a free online job-listing service to connect businesses with contract CPAs during the recession.