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Accounting News Roundup: Rothstein Kass Adds New Prinicipals; Cozy Auditor Relationships Should Be Broken Up; Another Municipal Fiscal Meltdown | 08.03.11

Rothstein Kass Appoints Three New Principals [PR Newswire]
Leading professional services firm, Rothstein Kass (www.rkco.com), today announced that Arthur Brown, Kashif Hussain and Daniel O’Connor have been named Principals in recognition of their ongoing contributions to the company’s success.

Analysis: Decades-old auditor ties under scrutiny in U.S. [Reuters]
Goldman Sachs has stuck with the same auditing firm since 1926, Coca Cola since 1921, General Electric since 1909 and Procter & Gamble since 1890. That’s going back 85, 90, 102 and 121 years. Each has relied on a different one of what are known today as the Big Four accounting firms. And now some U.S. accounting reformers are thinking that perhaps enough is enough: the time has come to rotate auditing firms.

IASB Chairman: IFRS Adoption Is in “Economic Interest of U.S.” [Journal of Accountancy]
Adopting IFRS would benefit the United States’ economy, the new chairman of the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) said July 29 during his first official visit to China. Speaking to a gathering of the Ministry of Finance’s Accounting Regulatory Department in Beijing, Hans Hoogervorst said, “U.S. investors invest globally, and U.S. companies seek international capital, and it is in the economic interest of the U.S. to adopt IFRSs,” according to a copy of the speech posted on the IASB website. “IFRSs support economic growth and establish a high-quality level playing field for globalized markets.”

Audit reveals ‘very significant’ accounting woes in Granger [Yakima Herald-Republic]
Granger’s accounting problems are so serious that if not corrected, the city could miss out on future federal grants, according to the state Auditor’s Office. A state audit showed the city didn’t report $500,000 in federal grants and failed to provide complete and accurate financial reports.

Mergis Group Accounting & Finance Employee Confidence Index Dips [Sacramento Bee]
The Accounting and Finance Employee Confidence Index, a measure of overall confidence among U.S. accounting and finance workers, slipped 2.1 points to 50.0 in the second quarter of 2011, according to a recent survey of 3,833 U.S. adults among which 183 are employed in Accounting and Finance commissioned by The Mergis Group®, the professional placement division of SFN Group, Inc. The survey, conducted online by Harris Interactive®, reveals that fewer workers are confident in the strength of the economy and in the future of their current employer.

China’s Mutant Turtles [FT]
Our research shows that the poor quality of accounting in China is an extension of a poor governance environment, with its origins in China’s cultural, political, economic and legal systems. After decades of communist rule the state is still trying to establish its legal authority and is unable to enforce the law impartially. The result is that people resort to personal connections and private information to protect their business dealings.

Restoring trust and saving the U.S. credit rating [Chicago Tribune]
Our elected officials don’t follow the rules to enforce honesty that they require of the private sector, such as the standards of Generally Accepted Accounting Practices. If voters really understood this, they might remove them from office and put some of them in jail. Washington’s ways have evolved with a veneer of legal legitimacy, when in fact those ways increasingly resemble the corruption we deplore in lesser-developed countries.

Wanted: Missionaries with accounting skills [Baptist Press]
Accountants may not be the first image that pops into people’s heads when talking about missionaries, but that’s exactly how Grece, a Nebraska native, answered his call to missions. He uses his financial skills in the office while also focusing on ministering to those around him — whether it’s frazzled missionaries or local villagers.

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