Acting Chief Accountant Speaks Out on Auditor Independence
Acting SEC Chief Accountant Paul Munter has issued a significant statement on auditor independence. See The Critical Importance of the...
2022 PCAOB Inspections Preview
The PCAOB’s inspection staff has released Spotlight: Staff Overview for Planned 2022 Inspections, its annual discussion of focus areas in...
Fueled by SPACs, Restatements Surge
Audit Analytics (AA) has released its annual report on public company restatements, 2021 Financial Restatements: A Twenty-One-Year Review....
Protiviti Reports that SOX Compliance Costs Continue to Rise
Consulting firm Protiviti has released the 2022 edition of its annual survey of Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) compliance costs, SOX...
EY Fined $100 Million for Ethics Exam Cheating
The SEC has charged Ernst & Young with violations of SEC and PCAOB rules requiring auditors that practice before the Commission to...
PCAOB Strengthens the Standards for Audits Involving Multiple Auditors
PCAOB has adopted amendments to its auditing standards to strengthen the requirements for planning and supervising audits involving...
SEC Rulemaking is in Hyperdrive: Spring 2022 Regulatory Agenda
On June 22, the Biden Administration released the Spring 2022 Unified Agenda of Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions – essentially a...
Directors and Senior Managers See Both ESG Reporting Challenges and Benefits
Reporting solutions provider Workiva has released the results of a survey of the “challenges, potential opportunities, and the positives”...
SEC Notches Another EPS Enforcement Case
On April 18, the SEC brought an administrative action against Rollins Inc. alleging that the pest control company reduced certain...
Cornerstone: Accounting Class Actions Fell Sharply Last Year
Cornerstone Research has issued its annual report on accounting class action litigation, Accounting Class Action Filings and...
Compared to Canada and Europe, in the U.S. the Cost of an Audit is High and Going Up
On April 25, the International Federation of Accountants (IFAC) published Audit Fees Survey 2022: Understanding Audit and Non-Audit...
PCAOB Wants to Hear How its Estimates and Specialists Standards are Working
The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board has issued a Request for Comment on the impact of its new standards for auditing...
SEC is Serious About ESG Disclosure Enforcement
In 2021, the SEC announced the formation of a task force in the Division of Enforcement “to proactively identify ESG-related misconduct.”...
SEC and PCAOB Provide Guidance on the Ukraine War’s Disclosure and Auditing Impact
The staff of the SEC’s Division of Corporation Finance has issued Sample Letter to Companies Regarding Disclosures Pertaining to Russia’s...
Cybersecurity Breach Disclosure is Surging
On April 12, Audit Analytics (AA) released Trends in Cybersecurity Breaches (available here for download), AA’s annual report on public...
SEC Acting Chief Accountant Warns Against Bias in Restatement Materiality Decisions
In Assessing Materiality: Focusing on the Reasonable Investor When Evaluating Errors, a statement issued on March 9, SEC Acting Chief...
SEC Proposes Cyber Risk Management and Attack Disclosure Requirements
On March 9, the SEC issued rule proposals to standardize public company disclosures regarding cybersecurity risk management, strategy,...
The PCAOB Reports on its 2021 Conversations with Audit Committee Chairs
During its 2021 inspections, Public Company Accounting Oversight Board inspection teams spoke with more than 240 audit committee chairs...