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Accounting News Roundup: PwC Capped Off 2017 With More Bad News | 01.02.18

pwc colonial award

Judge Says PricewaterhouseCoopers Was Negligent In Colonial Bank Failure [WSJ]
Late on Sunday, news broke that a judge in Alabama found PwC negligent in a lawsuit brought by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. for violating auditing rules and failing to “take steps that could have detected a $2 billion fraud” that contributed to Colonial Bank’s failure. Judge Barbara Jacobs Rothstein did dismiss other charges against the firm brought by the FDIC and Colonial’s bankruptcy trustee. Judge Rothstein will “now consider separately whether damages should be imposed on PwC, and how much.”

PwC ‘fell short’ on averting one of the biggest US bank collapses [FT]
The finding in the Colonial case didn’t match the magnitude of two other of PwC’s big settlements last year — MF Global and Taylor, Bean & Whitaker. Jim Peterson told the FT that whatever the judge rules, the finding will be”within PwC’s tolerance on a worst-case basis.”

Steinhoff Gains as Retailer Plans to Restate 2015 Results [Bloomberg]
The owner of Sleepy’s and Mattress Firm in the U.S., Poundland in the U.K., and a slew of other brands across the globe, will restate 2017 and 2016 results, and its Steinhoff International Holdings Pty Ltd. unit, listed in Frankfurt, will also restate 2015.

PCAOB delivers improved report card on Grant Thornton [ComplianceWeek, sub. req’d]
The 2016 report for Grant Thornton found deficiencies in 8 of the 34 audits examined or 24 percent. This improved on last year’s inspection that found deficiencies in 14 of 34 audits, for a rate of 41 percent.

BP Sees $1.5 Billion Charge for Last Quarter on U.S. Tax Law [Bloomberg]
The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, as expected, will force a lot of deferred tax adjustments.

Previously, on Going Concern…

ICYMI, President Trump went totally out of character, boasting that he knows taxes better than any CPA.

In Open Items, someone is looking for tips to passing the CPA exam in one go.

In other news:

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