SCOTUS Mulls SOX Scope
The Supreme Court of the United States heard arguments as to whether or not the whistleblower protections afforded by the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act should be extended to third-parties such as...
View ArticlePressure On to Complete Volcker Rule
Regulatory agencies are gearing up to complete their draft of the so-called "Volcker Rule" that came about as part of the Dodd-Frank Act, though are still hobbled by internal divisions, according to...
View ArticleSEC Looking at Non-GAAP Metrics
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has become interested in non-GAAP financial reporting metrics as a potential avenue for accountingfraud, according to the Wall Street Journal. Leading the...
View ArticleCanellos to Leave SEC
George Canellos, the co-director of the SEC's Division of Enforcement, shall be leaving the agency after four and a half years of service. Canellos, who began his tenure in the SEC as the director of...
View ArticleSEC Announces Exam. Priorities
The Securities and Exchange Commission has released its list of examination priorities for 2014, detailing where they want to devote the most energy in the various sectors that they regulate. In...
View ArticleSEC, CFTC, Tighten Belts
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) will have to do more with less as a result of the recently completed budget deal, according to Reuters,...
View ArticleBig 4 China Affiliates Barred from Audits
A Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) administrative law judge has barred the Big Four's China units from auditing U.S. public companies for the next six months due to refusing to turn over the...
View ArticleKPMG Pays $8.2M Over SEC Charge
Big Four AccountingFirm KPMG has agreed to pay $8.2 million in order to settle charges from the SEC that it violated auditor independence rules, according to the SEC. The SEC said that KPMG had...
View ArticleSEC Releases Four-Year Plan
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has released a draft of its strategic plan for the next four years. Broadly its strategic goals include: read more
View ArticleBig 4 to File China Appeal
The Chinese affiliates of the Big Four accounting firms are planning to appeal the recent administrative ruling that barred them from conducting audits of U.S. public companies due to their refusal to...
View ArticleStudy: SEC Staffers Savvy Investors
A study undertaken by researchers from Emory University and Georgia State University has shown that SEC employees are pretty damn good at picking stocks. The paper, "Stock Picking Skills of SEC...
View ArticleSEC Targets Whistleblower Suppression
The Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating KBR, one of the largest government contractors in the world and a key player during the occupation of Iraq, over claims that employees looking to...
View ArticleCybersecurity: A Rock and a Hard Place
When it comes to cybersecurity disclosures, how much is too much, especially when those same disclosures could be providing a veritable trail of breadcrumbs to your sensitive information? That's a...
View ArticleSEC Has More Conflict Mineral Guidance
The Securities and Exchange Commission has expanded its guidance on the new conflict mineral rule by posting more frequently asked questions, according to Compliance Week. One of the issues the...
View ArticlePart of Conflict Mineral Rule Struck
A federal appeals court in Washington D.C. struck down a provision in the SEC's conflict mineral rule that would require companies to declare whether their products are "DRC Conflict Free," said that...
View ArticleSEC Slams 3rd Party Standard Makers
SEC Commissioner Dan Gallagher expressed frustration with independent standard setting organizations who are technically not authorized to set requirements for public company filings, according to...
View ArticleGAO: SEC Vulnerable to Hackers
A report from the Government Accountability Office said that, despite improvement in some areas, the Securities and Exchange Commission's information technology infrastructure and protocols remain...
View ArticleSEC Comms. Oppose Conflict Min. Rules
Two commissioners from the Securities and Exchange Commission, in light of a recent court decision where a portion of the conflict mineral disclosure rules was deemed unconstitutional, called for the...
View ArticleSEC Accting. Fraud TF Launches Probes
The task force organized last year by the Securities and Exchange Commission to investigate accountingfraud will be opening up a new series of investigations focused on both traditional and emerging...
View ArticleKnow Your Regulatory Acronyms: a Primer
There are a lot of acronyms in the accounting world, and they seem to change every couple of years. Financial Executives Daily has written a primer on who does what in the accounting regulatory world,...
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