Author: Adrienne Gonzalez

Adrienne is a 15-year veteran of the accounting industry, if by "veteran" you mean "vulture prowling the periphery of the profession waiting for something exciting to happen." She has been spewing vitriol on Going Concern since the site was founded in 2009. A former CPA review employee, she has sat through more FAR classes than any CPA exam candidate ever could -- even one who has failed FAR seven times -- and can still recall most of the mnemonics all these years later.

Is the AICPA Lowering the Bar on the CPA Exam?

Friendly reminder: >75 is here to answer your CPA Exam questions so send them over.

Sadly, JDA is technically still employed by a CPA Review course (and, of course, not a CPA) but hey, if any of you are looking to protect the public interest, have at it.

This may just be some wild speculating here but I have to admit my first thought upon seeing this was that the AICPA is scared everyone will freak out when IFRS hits the CPA Exam on January 1, 2011 and bomb horribly. Does this mean it’ll be graded on a curve? If so, I’m starting to have some concerns about that “protecting the public interest” bit.


Lowering the bar, AICPA Board of Examiners style:

THE AICPA EXAMINATIONS TEAM IS SEEKING CPA NOMINEES TO SERVE ON CPA EXAMINATION PANELS

When the new Uniform CPA Examination is launched on January 1, 2011, changes in content, format, and structure will be introduced. These changes will require the current passing score to be re-examined. The process to do so will include convening four panels of CPAs – one for each examination section – to prepare the groundwork for the passing score decision by the AICPA Board of Examiners. A new passing score determination is necessary in conjunction with the new examination to ensure that legally defensible CPA Examination pass/fail decisions continue to be made in protection of the public interest.

Panel Nominees

The AICPA is seeking nominations for passing score panel membership. Nominees should be CPAs who:

• have been licensed for between 3 and 5 years
• have supervised entry-level CPAs during the past year
• have NO affiliation with CPA Examination review courses, and
• are willing to participate in an August 2010 two-day meeting in Chicago, IL at the expense of the AICPA.

The selection of panelists from among qualified nominees will be made to ensure broad representation from all segments of the profession and demographic categories. Panelists will be given training at the August meetings on their responsibilities as panel participants.

Submitting Nominations

Nominations may be submitted online at http://vovici.com/wsb.dll/s/4e5ag3f124 or the forms completed and returned by FAX to 609-671-2922. Or, the names and contact information of nominees may be sent by e-mail to passingscorepanel@aicpa.org The information collected about nominees will be used only for the purpose of selecting panel participants.

The deadline for submitting nominations is MARCH 31, 2010.

Like I said, JDA is out; any of you kids in on this?

Bernanke: Bailouts ‘Imposed No Cost on the Taxpayer’

Ben Bernanke claims there is “no net impact” to U.S. taxpayers involved in bailing out the TBTF banks, state unemployment funds, car companies, insurance companies, GSEs; need I continue? You know the list by now.

The impact in question comes from the size of the Fed’s swollen balance sheet, surely you are familiar with the number by now. I don’t have to remind you little beancounters that the Fed writes its own accounting manual, so take that “balance sheet” for what it is worth.

“These programs, which imposed no cost on the taxpayer, were a critical part of the government’s efforts to stabilize the financial system and restart the flow of credit,” said Bernanke in prepared remarks to the House Financial Services Committee. Not even a snow day could keep him from this one.


Have you ever seen a “company” drastically reduce the size of its balance sheet? Me neither. Next.

The indirect “net impact” of all of this, of course, is a drag on unemployment. While on a federal level, inflation will have to run hot enough to cover a growing deficit, bankrupt municipalities and states are bleeding businesses and residents dry. So who will be financing the Fed’s unloading of assets? It is unlikely to be the extinct “middle class”.

As many of you already know, CPA Trendlines tracks accounting unemployment numbers regularly. I know some of you are prone to stick to what we did last year but last year didn’t work and we’re about due for some sort of revolt. The BLS revisions represent a significant material deficiency in what we’re being told versus what is actually happening; you kids wouldn’t eat up the layoff posts if it didn’t exist.

So there is Bernanke’s net impact. Need I continue?

Unemployment taxes are up for those who can still afford a workforce. Encouraging.

Though not measurable in the same way as tax increases and wild inflation, the regulatory impact is also one worth recognizing. How many bad rules will result? I don’t do the math part, sorry. Let’s just sit around and let the rest of the world dictate how we can rebuild the integrity of our financial statements (?)

I’m not sure what “net impact” meant in economics class to our esteemed Fed Chairman but where I come from, bailout measures do appear to have a net impact on taxpayers, whether or not it’s actually called tax. I’m sure some tax accountants can agree with me on that?

Hallelujah! Church Accounting Miracles!

I had no idea how much a minister can make but now I do. Wait a minute, this just tells me how to bypass Service rules by writing checks in the church’s name. I might totally be in the wrong line of work.

Free Church Accounting (I’m not kidding) brings us a question from “Sharon” of Corsicana, Texas:

How much money does a minister have to make in order for money to be reported?

I started my church back up after 12 years vacancy. I do not have very many members. Right now we are 3 active members and other people stop in from time to time. I do not actually receive money. Since the church is striving I use the money to pay the light bill, get the grass moved.


Answer:

According to the IRS website, “Earnings of $400 or more are subject to self-employment taxes.” (that includes qualifying ministers)

If you are a church employee, income of $108.28 or more is subject to SE tax.

It would be better for you, if you opened a checking account in the church’s name and paid expenses out of it. If that’s not possible, just make sure and keep all of the receipts that show where the church funds are going.

Fascinating! I took the preliminary “Are You a Tax-Exempt Church” quiz on their website and failed miserably so I guess I’d make an awful 501(c)(3) but that’s probably for the best.

There are ways to fail at this of course, like the Spokane, WA priest who couldn’t keep his arms and legs (and other parts) inside of the vehicle at all times, financial mismanagement in the University of North Carolina system, and JDA favorite the University of Colorado’s wild credit card user with horrible hair.

I would never imply that more regulation is the answer; I’m merely pointing out that there’s a bit of work to be done in identifying non-profit fraud. Seriously, how can one detect fraud when the core basis of fund accounting is an imbalance between “expenses” and expenditures?

The Church of Jr Deputy Accountant Scientist? I’m down.

Is Tim Geithner a Closet IFRS Supporter?

Tim Geithner has inadvertently given his endorsement to standardized financial regulation around the globe, so is he also giving the adoption of IFRS in the US his approval?

Possibly, since he told ABC that “he wasn’t worried that tighter financial regulation would put U.S. banks at an international disadvantage. ‘I’m very confident we can make sure that we are working very closely to raise global standards around the world so we have a level playing field,’ Geithner said.” His motivations are only slightly suspect. Why?

Under IFRS, assets are overstated as derivatives are measured in gross exposure, as opposed to GAAP which concerns itself with net value. More magic financial reporting; of course Geithner would want to see banks magically healed by a change in accounting. If we’re going to do it, let’s also restate years 1999 – 2009 so we can compare at least.


Incredible what a slight adjustment can do (See also: page 19 of the Deutsche Bank report “Financial Transparency” – bwhahaha).

Speaking to the G7 finance ministers in Iqaluit, Canada this weekend, Geithner reiterated his commitment to globalization, accounting magic, and the heavy hand of regulation.

“We all share a deep commitment to try to move forward and reach agreement on a strong, comprehensive set of financial reforms on the timetable we all committed to last September,” he said at a closing press conference following a meeting of Group of Seven finance chiefs.

“That means agreement on … a new set of capital requirements for large global institutions by the end of this year,” he added, playing down the possibility that the Obama administration might be headed in a different direction from other governments.

TG is talking about pacts made with winners like Japan’s Shoichi Nakagawa, who blamed his “drunken behavior” on cold medicine. Sort of like Beavis blaming his tax problems on TurboTax.

Timmy is also somehow convinced that the United States will never lose its AAA rating but he forgets that the MBSs that the Fed is buying were also AAA once upon a time too. He also seems to have forgotten about our massive deficit.

At least he remembered to push the globalization agenda he’s been blabbering about all this time.

>75: What to Do Two Weeks Before Your Exam

Happy Friday CPA Exam munchkins! For the self-loathing types that are going through busy season and sitting for an exam, let’s discuss what you should be doing in the two weeks before your exam, not how to quit your job (not my line of expertise).

At this point, you should be through lecture videos and homework at least once. Really? You have two weeks left! If you’ve been disciplined up to this point, you’re feeling comfortable with most of the MCQ.

A final review at this point is essential. You have enough time to go back over weak areas and give everything a last look over. If you have software or your firm blew a bunch of money on overpriced programs to do this for you, use it. If you’re going with just a book, take a look at questions you’ve gotten wrong more than once and review those areas in the text.


Though we all know it’s illegal to discuss what’s actually on the exam, there are plenty of blogs and forums that share “commonly tested” items, many of which are updated often. The CPANet forums are a perfect example of candidates openly sharing their experiences and identifying common testing patterns. The AICPA Board of Examiners used to give paper and pencil candidates a COPY of their exam as they left so don’t let partners tell you it was way more rough back in their day. Still, there are channels available; it’s up to the candidate to use them.

The BoE has also committed to faster scoring and a continued evolution of exam content. They do not expressly state what that means for candidates, that’s why it’s important to ask questions and know about changes. The only real signals they’ve sent so far are that they are excited to start testing IFRS years before it is implemented in the US and the computerized exam is due for more changes in the years ahead. And? Get it over with now, whether or not BEC will be easier with communications but an extra half an hour.

Anyway, the last week. It’s your last chance to review weak spots and work through practice questions once more. I know you’re pissed at me for not writing “now you can screw off and play PS3 after 16 hours of work” but that’s not really how it works.

At this point, you shouldn’t expect to feel entirely confident and that’s okay; focus only on the last few, most heavily-tested areas. You should already know what these are, if they don’t, put off your exam and start asking questions or reading textbooks. Most CPA Review programs (even the cheap ones) give you some idea of what these areas are.

Hope that helps. On the next >75, we’ll talk about what “simulataneous IFRS implementation” really means for FAR unless you have a CPA exam question, in which case I’ll save my anti-IFRS rant for a different Friday.

Non-Profits Are Feeling the Pain

WSJ has a Monday piece “Once-Robust Charity Sector Hit With Mergers, Closings” (the Recession Forces Nonprofits to Consolidate) that may be found here. It tells the story of a “homeless” woman with terminal lung cancer and a charity no longer able to afford to help her out. Sad.

When one charity’s COO says “we’ve had funding cut after funding cut, and we never know when the next shoe is going to drop,” that is a bad sign.

Hit by a drop in donations and government funding in the wake of a deep recession, nonprofits—from arts councils to food banks—are undergoing a painful restructuring, including mergers, acquisitions, collaborations, cutbacks and closings.

“Like in the animal kingdom, at some point, the weaker organizations will not be able to survive,” says Diana Aviv, chief executive of Independent Sector, a coalition of 600 nonprofits.

I saw that on the Discovery Channel and it wasn’t pretty.

Note: the Service says the value of your blood is not deductible as a charitable donation but cars are. As of 2005, cars are only deductible at FMV, not Blue Book. Damn you, fair value, foiled by the free market again!

Blame the Service for tightening its charitable donation rules at the worst possible time? Not sure on that one. While you’re reluctant to donate your $200 Toyota (ha) to charity because you could have claimed $2,000 under old rules, find some comfort in the fact that (alleged) terrorist “non profits” can not file for 2 years and somehow get away with it. You wonder why I advocate fixing the system from the ground up?

You can text $10 to Haiti but what about the “Economic Homeless” here in America? asks Young Money.

If this were a survey and you asked me “What do you think the IRS could do to encourage charitable donations?” I would answer “Tax breaks. It isn’t the Treasury’s job to distribute bailouts.” Yet they continue to behave as though it is their duty.

See the problem yet?

New Obama Proposal Would Invest $30 Billion TARP Funds in Small Banks

One can only postulate that since there was no room in President Obama’s bloated 2010 budget for small business initiatives, he instead chose to apply some TARP money that’s just lying around to get small business working again. I wish Mr President the best of luck on that plan as he’ll be needing it.

WSJ:

President Barack Obama proposed a $30 billion small business lending program Tuesday, the latest in a series of administration efforts to jump-start hiring by the nation’s small businesses.

The program, which Mr. Obama detailed at an appearance in Nashua, N.H., would invest $30 billion from the government’s Troubled Asset Relief Program in community banks to encourage them to lend to small businesses. If approved by Congress, the program would incentivize small and midsize banks to provide loans valued at several times that figure.


Didn’t we invest $700 billion in the Too Big to Fail banks for this same purpose? Not that it matters, we’ll try it again with the hopes that community banks will be able to accomplish what TBTF couldn’t.

A proactive sort of administration, White House officials were already prepared to counter the argument that TARP was never intended as a general piggy bank for funding the administration’s whims:

“The law is very clear: The monies recouped from the TARP shall be paid into the general fund of the Treasury for the reduction of the public debt. It’s not for a piggy bank,” [Sen. Judd] Gregg said.

[White House Budget Director Peter] Orszag said new legislation would be required to create the new small-business plan. He said the cost of the plan would depend on the subsidy rate of new activity and wouldn’t amount to a net cost, in terms of the deficit, of $30 billion.

Considering that he’s referring to a deficit of $3.8 trillion, I guess $30 billion isn’t really anything to get stressed out about after all.

Meanwhile, can community banks counter the continued deterioration of commercial real estate weighing on their balance sheets? I guess we’ll have to wait it out and see.

How to Charge the Client: Killing the Billable Hour with VeraSage’s Ron Baker

I’ve long wanted to track down VeraSage’s Ron Baker and pick his brilliant brain; at last, JDA had the opportunity to steal a few minutes with the man credited for killing the billable hour.

In his 15-some years crusading against the ridiculous measurement of “time” as a performance gauge, Ron has made quite a few steps in the right direction. Seven to ten percent of 90,000 firms have moved away from time sheets and toward “value pricing”, with 1,000 or so firms eliminating the billable hour completely. While he admits it’ll be a cold day in hell when the Big 4 follow suit, he’s encouraged by the momentum.


“There is a change and it is coming from customers,” he says, “[unfortunately] the billable hour has survived many recessions.” The rigid “that’s how it’s always been” structure of public accounting, specifically, doesn’t seem to be taking the idea well. “They’d rather be precisely wrong than approximately right,” he says of major accounting firms trapped in the billable hour vice.

Encouraging value pricing in pay structures is a slow process, he says, equating the movement to that of Germ Theory in the 1800s. It was hundreds of years from the time “contact contagion” was theorized to the time it was generally accepted in medicine and eliminating the antiquated pricing structure of employee incentive won’t go down without a fight either.

Billed as “a think tank dedicated to promulgating and teaching Value Pricing, Customer Economics, and Human Capital Development to professionals and businesses around the world,” VeriSage seeks not to revolutionize business but improve it.

“You don’t let your surgeons pierce ears,” says Baker, meaning value pricing implies a company’s best soldiers will be dispatched to serve their respective battalions. In simpler terms, employees are paid results, not for how long they’re sitting in a chair. And in an uncertain economic environment, aren’t results what matter above all else? I’m not sure it could be much simpler.

Baker knows he’s got his work cut out for him but yours truly is 100% behind the idea. As a person who can tear up in one hour what five people can’t even accomplish in two, I get it. Boy do I get it.

Lucky for those who choose to accept what Ron is selling, he’s also a brilliant business mind. Knowing that Michelle Golden may have potentially criticized his website, he chose instead to hire her as a consultant. Genius! (Disclaimer: JDA loves Michelle Golden and isn’t just saying that because she doesn’t want to get torn up on her website – her “Accounting Blog list” is the most comprehensive I’ve ever seen.) She sits on their Board so she gets it. Excellent!

Want more JDA? Check out all of her posts for Going Concern here.

Bernanke’s Next Four Years

We’re skipping >75 this week because apparently none of you have any CPA exam questions. That’s sad. Really? None? Well if you do, send them over. Please. JDA needs to eat.

Anyway, let’s talk about Bernanke’s confirmation!

WSJ:

Ben Bernanke won the backing of the Senate for a second four-year term as chairman of the Federal Reserve by a comfortable margin Thursday. Even with that storm behind him, Mr. Bernanke faces formidable political and economic challenges made tougher by the bruising confirmation fight.

Yeah, ok, let’s ignore the fact that the Fed spent the last week buttering up everyone they could to get to push Bernanke through. WSJ made it really easy with a chart of Senators who were going to vote for him, who weren’t, and who were undecided. It was a fucking Fed Telethon trying to save Bernanke’s ass and with a 70-30 vote, apparently they won.


Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher wrote in the WSJ that Congress is Politicizing the Fed but Market Ticker argued that The Fed is Politicizing the Fed. What do you call making a last ditch effort to convince undecided Senators to keep the Bernanke crack flowing? That’s not necessarily the Fed getting political, it’s just them trying to save their own asses.

I’m not going to rant about Zimbabwe Ben and his mission to destroy the dollar. In some ways, I’m glad this thing is over with and Bernanke is the least of all evils (Larry Summers for one) but it’s funny that markets reacted as they did when Bernanke’s confirmation was “up in the air” (LOL, we all knew what would happen).

I would hate to go all conspiratorial and throw out “manipulation” as the culprit, nor can I pretend to know what charts mean.

Don’t miss The Bernanke Confirmation: Incompetence, Indifference and Institutional Inertia via Huffington Post.

DealBook:

The Senate voted 70 to 30 on Thursday afternoon to confirm Ben S. Bernanke as chairman of the Federal Reserve for another four years, Sewell Chan of The New York Times reports from Washington. The confirmation came minutes after senators voted 77 to 23 to end a debate in which critics excoriated the central bank’s handling of the financial crisis.

The confirmation was a victory for President Obama, who had called Mr. Bernanke a critical leader in the nation’s recovery from recession, but the rancor in the debate also signaled the extent to which the Fed, once little known to the public, has become the object of populist anger over high unemployment and bank bailouts.

Grrrrr.

Non-Profit Organizations Feeling the Pain of Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance

You’ve already seen me rail on SOX and I’m not the only one.

Skeptical CPA, Accounting Onion, Business Insider’s John Carney, Re: The Auditors (and Francine here on Going Concern). Need I point you to more?

I am not classically trained in recognizing Service threats but this certainly feels like one.

Accounting and Tax Tips:

The Internal Revenue Service today reminded tax-exempt organizations to make sure they file their annual information form on time. In 2010 the tax-exempt status of any non-profit that has not filed the required form in the last three years will be revoked.

The Pension Protection Act of 2006 requires that non-profit organizations that do not file a required information form for three consecutive years automatically lose their Federal tax-exempt status. This requirement has been in effect since the beginning of 2007.


The costs of compliance begin to add up and suddenly it starts to reek of 404(b); compliance for the sake of compliance does not equal nor even assist transparency.

I spoke to Chris Leach, a former not-for-profit auditor who has served on several NFP boards, who gave some insight into the problem with the 990. Let me tick off just a few “concerns”:

• Some of the smaller non-profits don’t have anyone on their board qualified to do the 990. It’s not a 1040 and problems are numerous.

• NFP board members are exposed to liability, being forced to “sign off” on 990s. That should sound familiar to any auditor who has been at the job for longer than ten years or so.

• Increased regulatory pressure has been proven to distort true financial condition, not necessarily make it any more transparent.

Any of this sound eerily familiar?

Many boards do not have members equipped to adequately review and sign Form 990, so they are still exposing themselves to liability as a result of improperly filed forms. “Bad publicity is the largest implication in my view, especially for organizations facing financial stress, and even more so in this economic environment,” Chris told me. “Beyond that, from a board member’s perspective, the biggest problem would be misstatements on the Form 990, which could potentially lead to personal liability for the board.”

Chris is slightly more reasonable than yours truly, saying “Just the simple day-to-day administration of tax issues puts pressure on smaller not-for-profit organizations. [However], when a not-for-profit organization isn’t a worthy steward of its donors’ trust, donors feel betrayed, so they want more transparency.”

Fair enough. Bring on the transparency (and the headaches?)!

Jr Deputy Accountant and Michael Panzner Discuss 2010 Part II: The Impotent Fed; An Election Year; Waiting for the Recovery

Thumbnail image for Thumbnail image for Thumbnail image for angry bear.jpgIn case you missed part one of JDA’s 2010 Outlook interview with Financial Armageddon’s Michael Panzner, you can find it on Going Concern here.
For the first half of my 2010 talk with Panzner, I focused on the other shoes left to drop; commercial real estate, political backlash, and the threat of the massive bubble still being inflated in China. But even bears have their bright sides and Panzner is no different. So what do we have to look forward to this year? Oh crap, more doom and gloom; sorry, I got my interviews mixed up.


Panzner points to our leaders’ missteps throughout the crisis as a major factor that could place a damper on any hope of recovery. “Many of the problems and imbalances that helped about the crisis have gotten worse,” he says, “That means people have less in reserve than they did before, and many have not positioned themselves for a ‘new normal.’ That suggests the next leg down, economically speaking at least, could be much worse than what we’ve experienced so far.” If only we’d been prepared for the worst instead of coddled into believing everything is better, eh?
When asked to take a guess as to when the Fed would finally raise interest rates, Panzner gave an interesting answer. “In my view, the Fed is no longer in control – of the economy or its destiny. For the most part, market and other forces, not the FOMC, will determine what happens to interest rates in future.” So I guess it doesn’t matter when they’ll raise rates, markets are no longer listening. Or are they?
A big picture sort of guy, Panzner identifies sociopolitical threats as another major concern this year, and with this being an election year (hello, Scott Brown anyone?), I’m willing to go on the record as agreeing wholeheartedly with him (shock). “Wait and see what happens to the social and political mood if and when the economy rolls over,” he says ominously.
Oh, believe me, JDA is waiting. And waiting. And waiting. Still no rollover but dammit, I’ll still be here twiddling my thumbs.
Hopefully I’ll get a chance to check in with Panzner again come summer to see where we are.
Editor’s Note: Want more JDA? You can see all of her posts for GC here, her blog here and stalk her on Twitter.

>75: Adrienne Gonzalez Shares Her Tips on How to Study for BEC in Just a Week

Thumbnail image for Thumbnail image for Thumbnail image for panic.jpgI’m not saying you’ll pass, I’m teaching you how to prepare in a week and maybe eke by. You already spent the money, you might as well give it a shot.
Let me be clear: I don’t advocate this. It’s important to give yourself time to study. BEC should take between 64 and 80 hours to prepare for. There are 168 hours in a week – work = 128 (our friend with a week to study for BEC – who requests to remain anonymous – is in tax so he has about 110) – sleeping 6 hours a night = 86 so if you don’t waste any waking hours commuting or eating, you can do it. You shouldn’t.


If nothing else, you’ll know what to expect on the exam in the next window. If you don’t study at all, try to retain what you can when you sit for this exam that you’re not ready for. Even though the AICPA BoE switches questions up from window to window and your next exam will be a little different, just go and pay attention.
There is a small chance you can pass. Do you know nothing about variance analysis? Clueless on economics? Your chances at passing will be smaller though I won’t pretend to have actual figures on that. The better your foundation, the easier it will be for you to fudge your way through it in a week. If you’re going into it blind, you’re probably not going to do well so focus on what came up on the exam.

Using the example above (or whatever your work/sleep/live schedule is), focus your attention on doing as many MCQ as possible. Even if you don’t understand them, sometimes working through them will make things click. You can try a cram course but your brain learns in layers so you can’t approach this like a final you didn’t study for. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, that’s just what I know.

The best piece of advice I can give you is to plan better next time. Don’t pay for all 4 parts with one NTS unless you have a huge block of time to take exam after exam. Got it?

Want more JDA? You can see all of her posts for GC here, her blog here and stalk her on Twitter.