Financial reporting

New research indicates that many investors tend to overlook the vague misgivings that auditors might express in letters included with their audit reports, even though those warnings often turn out to be a predictor of future trouble with a company’s financial statements.

Moving past simplification to ‘qualitification’

Preparing for the new revenue recognition standards

The European Commission has issued a report evaluating the use of International Financial Reporting Standards over the past decade in the European Union.

Asia’s largest commodity trader Noble Group Ltd. took on its critics with an open letter defending its accounting methods and valuations of a coal asset.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has upgraded its EDGAR online system for financial filings and will no longer support an older version of the U.S. GAAP financial reporting taxonomy.

Investors and regulators are hoping to see the Financial Accounting Standards Board and the International Accounting Standards Board somehow reconcile their differing approaches to accounting for loan impairments and credit losses in their financial instruments project.

The institute has recommended to the IRS that taxpayers making an accounting method change for mischaracterized research and experimental expenditures under Sec. 174 should compute a Sec. 481 (a) adjustment.

James Schnurr, chief accountant in charge of the Security and Exchange Commission’s Office of the Chief Accountant, said he disagrees with a former SEC chairman about abandoning convergence with International Financial Reporting Standards.

U.S. state and local governments will have to report billions of dollars in health-care liabilities on their balance sheets under an accounting change aimed at improving disclosure of retiree benefits.

We can see a bigger picture and look further out into the future than those of you who fight your daily battles down in the trenches.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged Deutsche Bank AG with filing misstated financial reports during the height of the financial crisis that failed to take into account a material risk for potential losses estimated to be in the billions of dollars, and Deutsche Bank agreed to pay a $55 million penalty to settle the charges.

The Financial Accounting Standards Board has released a proposed accounting standards update to clarify the guidance on performance obligations and licensing contained in the new revenue recognition standard.

The Institute of Certified Public Accountants in Ireland, also known as CPA Ireland, has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Association of Certified Accountants and Auditors of Belarus, further extending the Institute’s international network and influence in Europe.

Securities and Exchange Commission chief accountant James Schnurr is rethinking a proposal he made last December that the SEC allow U.S. companies the option of providing some information, such as revenues, using International Financial Reporting Standards as a supplement to U.S. GAAP without requiring reconciliation.

The Securities and Exchange Commission, which polices public companies’ financial reports, lacks internal controls over its own accounting, a government watchdog said Thursday.

Thomson Reuters has introduced PPC’s Guide to SSARS Preparation Engagements to explain the new financial statement preparation service introduced by the American Institute of CPAs’ Accounting and Review Services Committee.

PricewaterhouseCoopers’ latest Trendsetter Barometer—a quarterly survey of top executive officers at privately held U.S. businesses—has something positive in it for everyone, according to Ken Esch, the PwC Private Company Services partner who conducted the survey.

Many large privately held companies are more profitable and are growing revenues faster than publicly traded companies in the U.S., according to new data.

The Securities and Exchange Commission voted Wednesday to propose rules to require companies to disclose the relationship between executive compensation and the financial performance of a company.