All Compliance Week articles in Web Issue – Page 725
-
Blog
ECI Launches New Data Security Solution, PayArmor
Electronic Commerce International, a payment processing solutions provider, today announced the launch of PayArmor, a new way for companies to protect customer data from cyber criminals. PayArmor is a multi-layered suite of security and compliance services built to safeguard businesses against fraud, credit card data security breaches and to ...
-
Blog
Computer Sciences to Pay $190 Million in Accounting Probe; Makes Compliance Enhancements
Computer Sciences Corp. (CSC) disclosed in a securities filing yesterday that it has reached a $190 million proposed settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission and will restate three years of financial results to resolve accounting issues dating back four years ago. The SEC charged the IT services company with ...
-
Blog
CSC Discloses $190 Million Settlement Agreement With SEC
Computer Sciences Corp. is settling an SEC enforcement action relating to accounting errors in the company’s 2009-2012 financial statements. As part of the settlement, CSC will pay a penalty of $190 million and restate past financial statements. CSC said the errors concerned operations in Europe and Australia, and the company’s ...
-
Blog
SEC Staffers Try to Untangle Business Unit Accounting Issues
Image: Title: RogersAt a recent national accounting conference on regulatory issues, staff members at the Securities and Exchange Commission, including professional accounting fellow Chris Rogers (left), offered lots of advice on how companies can better explain to investors the intricacies of joint ventures, spinoffs, pushdown accounting, and segment reporting in ...
-
Blog
SEC Relaxes View on Goodwill Impairment Test Date
Staff members at the SEC are easing up their expectation on preferability letters when companies decide to change the date of their annual goodwill impairment testing. Acknowledging the judgment that goes into making such a determination, staff members will no longer request a preferability letter to be obtained and filed, ...
-
Blog
Another Step Forward in Tackling Cyber-Security Risk
Image: Dec. 31—COSO’s Internal Control — Integrated Framework talks a good game about being useful beyond financial reporting risks, but Compliance Week Editor Matt Kelly has always wondered how that works in practice. Then came a nifty piece of guidance: a taxonomy of operational risks in cyber-security, published by the ...
-
Blog
Oil Companies Seek to Bypass Proxy Access Proposals
In advance of 2015 annual meetings, Marathon Oil and Cabot Oil are seeking the SEC’s blessing for plans to exclude proxy access proposals submitted on behalf of New York City’s pension funds. They cite a recent decision to grant no-action relief to Whole Foods, where the grocery chain sought to ...
-
Blog
Bank Leumi Fined $400 Million for Tax Evasion Scheme; Bans Compliance Officer
Israel-based Bank Leumi has agreed to pay a total of $400 million to resolve charges that it conducted an illegal cross-border scheme to help U.S. clients evade taxes by hiding income and assets in offshore bank accounts at the bank’s locations in Israel, Switzerland, Luxembourg, and the United States. Details ...
-
Blog
Israeli Police Launch Biggest Ever Anti-Corruption Operation
Dec. 29—Israeli police have made more than two dozen arrests in what some say is the most significant anti-corruption operation in the country’s history. Officials have been questioned on suspicion of corruption, embezzlement of public funds, and illegal money transfers. According to police, “millions” of shekels of public funds were ...
-
Blog
FuelCell Energy Audit Chair Resigns
James Gerson, who served as a board member of FuelCell Energy for 22 years, resigned from his position on Dec. 18, citing the company's failure to address limited domestic sales. Gerson was also chairman of the audit and finance committee and a member of the executive committee, as well as ...
-
Blog
Debt Modification May Lead to Hedge Accounting Questions
Dec. 29—A friendly reminder from the SEC and auditing experts: If your company plans to issue or modify debt now, before the Fed raises interest rates sometime in 2015, check your debt agreements carefully to see whether you have any embedded derivatives language in there—since that could trigger new disclosures ...
-
Blog
'British Madoff' Disappears After $200M Fraud Unravels
The UK press reported this week that a trader named Joe Lewis of Yorkshire has disappeared after admitting earlier this month that his investment firm actually stopped operating back in 2009. Despite the firm not engaging in any trading for years, investors in JL Trading continued to receive detailed monthly ...
-
Blog
Knowles Appoints New Board Member
Knowles, a global supplier of advanced micro-acoustic solutions and specialty components, has appointed appointed Didier Hirsch to its board of directors effective immediately. He will also serve on the audit committee and the governance and nominating committee. Details inside.
-
Blog
Petrobras Creates Special Committee Amid Corruption Probe
The board of Brazilian state-owned oil giant Petrobras has created a special committee whose function will be to oversee an existing independent internal investigation amid widespread bribery allegations. "This committee will act independently and will have a direct reporting line with the board of directors," the company said. Details inside.
-
Blog
Justice Department Intervenes in Whistleblower Suits Against Omnicare
The Justice Department recently intervened in two consolidated whistleblower lawsuits against drug company Omnicare over allegations that it solicited and received millions of dollars in kickbacks from drug maker Abbott Laboratories. “Although the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Virginia is small, we will not waver in our ...
-
Blog
OECD: France Still Lags on Anti-Bribery Efforts
France still has several more improvements to make when it comes to combating the bribery of foreign public officials involving French companies, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's follow-up report to its Phase 3 recommendations. Of the OECD’s 33 recommendations, the group deemed four to be fully ...
-
Blog
'You Know What's Cool? A Billion Dollars,' Part II
"A million dollars isn't cool. You know what's cool? A billion dollars." -- Sean Parker, The Social Network In 2009, when Irving Picard and his law firm, Baker & Hostetler, had been working as trustee on the Madoff case for less than a year, I observed that the firm had ...
-
Blog
SEC: Don’t Ignore Mortality Tables at Year-End
If your company is planning to set aside new mortality tables in arriving at assumptions about pension and other post-employment benefit obligations because they are simply too new, that might be a mistake. The SEC recently sent a clear signal to the accounting profession that companies need to consider new ...
-
Article
Britain Braces for New Supervisory Regime
Image: British Banks are bracing for “incredible pressure” in 2015 as they implement new rules to make senior executives personally accountable to regulators. Compliance functions will help lead the creation of the new Senior Managers Regime, complete with certification overload. “Regulators will expect compliance in the spirit of the regulations, ...
-
Article
Maturing Conflict Minerals Programs in Year 2
Image: Now that everyone has closed their Excel files on the first year of conflict minerals compliance, companies are pushing toward greater automation in Year 2. Reducing lines of data about smelters in your supply chain is one step, improving data integrity another. “Technology can help you understand the supply ...