Accounting change will expose true condition of pension funding [FW News Sentinel]
The most important issue surrounding GASB's rule change is the way governments must report the level and type of future payment obligations on pensions. For most governments, these rules don't matter much. For a responsible municipal government that has almost fully funded its pensions, the most notable impact will be that the value of the reported pension value will be subject to more pronounced ups and downs with the market. Investment managers and agencies that provide grades for each local government's ability to issue bonds will be able to figure this out just fine.
2-week trial expected for accountant in slaying [AP]
A two-week trial is expected for a southwestern Michigan certified public accountant in the slaying of a prominent 70-year-old colleague.
A renter’s story: No regrets, says Vancouver accountant [Globe and Mail]
There are renters who refuse to buy into home ownership. Take a woman we’ll call Jane, for example. The 36-year-old accountant arrived in Vancouver more than a dozen years ago to start her career and decided to rent. “I wasn’t sure I was going to stay here in Vancouver, I wasn’t sure about my job and I kind of wanted to travel,” she said. “And eventually, that’s what I did. When I was 25, I took a leave of absence from my job and took six months to go and travel. If I’d had a mortgage, I wouldn’t have done that.”
How Wheels Came Off of Hertz' Accounting [Compliance Week]
It's an experience almost anyone can appreciate: your car seems to perform so well for so long—then, suddenly, all the little things go at once. And you're stuck on the side of the road. So seems to be the case with $10.7 billion Hertz, the auto rental company that warned on June 6 of a massive financial restatement yet to come. In a Form 8-K filing, Hertz warned that its current quarterly filing would be late and that its financial statements for 2011 should no longer be relied upon.
'You have a problem with credibility': IRS chief comes under fire at House hearing [FOX]
Embattled IRS Commissioner John Koskinen weathered another round of heated questioning at a Monday night hearing where lawmakers challenged his credibility over the discovery that years' worth of emails from ex-IRS official Lois Lerner have gone missing. House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., who has subpoenaed a former IRS lawyer to testify at another hearing on the emails Tuesday morning, publicly tangled with Koskinen on Monday night. In one fiery exchange, Issa told him: “We have a problem with you and you have a problem with credibility.”
Examining a Scandal Within a Scandal About Emails at the I.R.S. [NYT]
Republican lawmakers suspect foul play. At a hearing on Friday before the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, Republicans accused the I.R.S. of “stonewalling,” “obstruction” and “deceit.” Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, the Republican nominee for vice president in 2012, effectively called Mr. Koskinen a liar, telling him, “I don’t believe you.”
China government audit uncovers corruption [Xinhua]
Financial audits of government finances in 2013 helped uncover 314 serious cases of "law and disciplinary violations" involving 1,100 people, a new report has showed. These people's illicit acts were found by auditors of central and local revenue and spending last year, according to the National Audit Office's (NAC) 2013 audit report to the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress on Tuesday. The guilty parties mainly work at government offices with administrative approval rights or departments controlling important state assets or resources, the NAC said in the report, but it did not reveal how these people were dealt with.
Financier gets 10 years for $100 million fraud [AP]
Authorities say a Florida financier who bilked victims around the world in a $100 million loan fraud has been sentenced to 10 years in federal prison. Jeffrey Spanier also was ordered to pay nearly $21 million in restitution at his sentencing Monday in San Diego. Prosecutors say Spanier ran the scam through his Boca Raton-based company, Amerifund Capital Finance.
Soul-Sucking BigLaw Jobs Are Coming Back in Fashion [Gawker]
Oh goodie!