Accountability

PCAOB Chair James R. Doty this week expressed optimism about ongoing efforts to open Chinese accounting firms to inspections from U.S.

President Obama signed the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act into law today, ending the immunity from insider trading laws once enjoyed by members of Congress and their staff, according to CNN, less than two weeks after the measure was approved nearly unanimously by the Senate.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has filed suit against two Texas-based executives from a surgical products manufacturer who, while not directly responsible, nonetheless benefited from a series of accounting frauds perpetuated by their company from 2006 to 2008, according to an SEC press release. The lawsuit, directed against ArthroCare Corporation CEO Michael A.

A six-line amendment to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 could put to bed a controversial Public Company Accounting Oversight Board’s proposal to mandate audit firm rotation, reports Compliance Week.

The U.S. Senate approved legislation banning inside trading by members of Congress on a 96-3 vote on Thursday, sending the STOCK Act to the president to now be signed into law, according to the New York Times.

Law enforcement officials have reported a dramatic rise in tax refund fraud, a trend that has accelerated partially due to the increasing use of online tax processing and partially due to new IRS policies designed to speed up refund payments, according to CNN, a racket that has already stolen billions of dollars from taxpayers nationwide.

The fate of R. Allen Stanford, the mustachioed billionaire arrested in 2009 for his alleged role in a $7 billion Ponzi scheme, is now in the hands of a 12-person jury after the defense and prosecution in his fraud trial finished their closing statements, according to the New York Times.

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) released a proposed new standard today intended to improve auditor evaluation of a public company's identification of, accounting for, and disclosure about its relationships and transactions with related parties, enhance the auditor's identification and evaluation of a company's significant unusual transactions, and improve understanding of a company's financial relationships with its executive officers, according to a PCAOB press release.

The New York State Education Department’s Quality Review Oversight Committee approved on Feb. 8 the NYSSCPA as a sponsoring organization that may administer and oversee mandatory quality reviews in New York State.

Four days after the initial deadline, California and New York have finally agreed to sign on to the multi-billion dollar settlement with the nation’s five largest banks after being among the deal’s harshest critics as it was negotiated, according to Bloomberg. With these two large states in on the agreement, the settlement, which would go toward homeowner relief programs, could be valued as high as $39 billion, continued Bloomberg.