Category: KPMG

KPMG Prolongs the Agony by Releasing Just UK Revenue Results

Thumbnail image for 200px-KPMG.svg.pngThose of you that are dancing on one leg for KPMG’s global revenue results are going to have suffer with the anxiety for awhile longer. We know, we know. We’d love for the whole reporting season to limp into history but we have yet to hear Tim Flynn put his positive spin on this year’s revenue results.
Oh sure, we’re getting teased today by the UK firm and its European parent but this just prolongs the agony:

The UK firm saw revenues fall by 1.6%, to £1.63bn for the 30 September year end.
Profits fell 1.3% to £382m from £387m.
KPMG Europe’s revenues were €3.5bn, a 0.4% decrease on the previous year.
Its joint chairmen said the results were a “creditable performance”.
“We might have hoped for better economic conditions in our second year as a merged firm but rather than put our expansion plans on hold we have continued to pursue a whole range of strategic initiatives that will shape our performance over future years,” said John Griffith-Jones and Rolf Nonnenmacher.

Despite the disappointment Even with this creditable performance, Europe wasn’t without its problems, seeing the tax revenues drop 12%. No worries though, they promise to pull their weight 2010:

After suffering a 12% fall in tax revenues, Griffith-Jones said the service line was set to hold firm with the rest of the business next year.
“We resized the practice, and are fine where we are, [it’s performance] should be much more in line with the rest of the firm – it’s taken the pain.”

That’s the spirit! Lemons into lemonade. Now make with the band-aid ripoff method on these global results. Nobody’s expecting the world. Dump the press release, get a pep talk from TF and get back out there Kylnveldians. Here’s to 2010!
KPMG UK chief lines up modest 2010 growth [Accountancy Age]

KPMG Has to Be Pretty Happy with the Golfer They Chose to Sponsor

Phil-Mickelson_Tim Flynn.jpgAs we mentioned yesterday, Accenture is on the hunt for a new poster boy. While we speculated that poaching Phil from the House of Klynveld as a possibility for Accenture it’s more likely that the spotlight will be falling on Mickelson and his KPMG cap (black or white, depending on the mood).
Although Phil won’t be dancing on Tiger’s grave, Tim Flynn may have been quietly making the rounds at 345 Park high fiving anyone and everyone at work on the Monday after Tiger’s crash.
If you’ve got any thoughts on how TF celebrated (sweater vests for everyone!) discuss in the comments.

Operation Bear Hugs Debrief

Thumbnail image for Tim_Bear_King_jpeg.jpgSeriously Kylnveldians, we were hoping for a stellar report on last Friday’s nationwide Bear Hugs but so far we’ve heard nothing (other than some people were bolting early to get their drink on).
We’ll take your radio silence as admission that you had an awesome time and that not having an open bar rager wasn’t so bad after all. Besides, it’s for the kids.
There’s video of the New York Office’s get-together over CBS2 where we learn that there was actual sewing involved and a dancing bear to keep everyone entertained.
Share your thoughts on the experience including if your bear’s head ended up on its ass, if you couldn’t resist spiking the punch, or if you were MIA and what your punishment is.

Rumor Mill: KPMG Debunking ‘Six Year Manager’ Rumors?

corp_ladder.jpgWhile many Klynveldians are getting amped to cobble together some bears for the kids this morning we’ll pass along a little rumor about a rumor.

The rumor that the KPMG bigwigs have been considering a six year timeline to make manager in the audit practice has been kicked around for at least a couple years. Naturally, there were two schools of thought:

• Managers thought it was good idea

• SAs thought it was a terrible idea

According to a tip we received, apparently there is an email floating around that says the rumors about a “six year program are not true and that the firm will continue with existing promotion timing.”

A friend of GC told us that while it’s entirely possible that such an email exists, it’s definitely not coming down from 345 Park and could be some local office trying to calm down those SAs that are considered flight risks.

Regardless of the rumored debunking, the path to partner is certainly becoming longer as we reported earlier this week, and early promotions will still happen based on need or political maneuvering.

If you’ve been notified that your promotion timing is still on track, by email or otherwise, pass the info along or discuss in the comments.

Are You Ready to Build Some Bears KPMG?

Tim_Bear_King_jpeg.jpg“Tim, you really shouldn’t have. Seriously. I’m a King, for crying out loud.”

In case you’ve forgotten, KPMG’s bear-building extravaganza is tomorrow and word around the campfire is that everyone is psyched.

At least one office is dedicating the better part of the morning to the “Town Hall” portion of festivities which sounds like it could be a real hoot. We’re guessing there might be a little session regarding stationery controls, given the whole Canopy sitch.

Since all the offices are having their get-downs tomorrow keep us updated throughout the day on anything interesting that comes up.

(UPDATE) KPMG’s Letterheadgate May Require the Firm to Revisit Stationery Controls or Get Rid of the Blue Squares

kpmg_pink.gifAll right Klynveldians, we don’t know which one of you was a little generous with the letterhead but you’ve really done it.
Jeremy Blackburn, COO and President of Canopy Financial was able to raise $75 million for Canopy Financial based on bogus audit reports he provided to investors and pocketed more than $2 million for himself, according to the SEC’s complaint against Blackburn and the Company.


We’ll give the man credew the script:

Blackburn sent [Canopy CEO, Vikram] Kashyap an email dated June 30, 2009, attaching the KPMG Audit Report and the audited Canopy financial statements, with an email subject heading of “Audit Finally Complete,” and email text stating “I never wanna [sic] go through this again!!”

Kashyap apparently wasn’t in on the little secret that KPMG was not engaged to audit squat for Canopy. Nice work staying on top of everything, Vik. Meanwhile, Canopy’s investment bank, Financial Technology Partners, didn’t need an email telling them the audit was hell. They just ran to VCs with the notion that everything was on the up and up.
The bank is all bent out of shape because they’re taking heat and claim ‘We clearly had no clue about any such wrongdoing.’ Who wants to bother with the auditors? As Michael Arrington of Tech Crunch notes, “A 10 second phone call could have cleared this up before investors plowed $85 million into the company.”
The whole thing finally went south when Canopy’s new general counsel contacted an acquaintance at KPMG to help him find a new CFO. Canopy’s general counsel then sent over the “audit report.”

KPMG quickly responded to Canopy and advised Canopy in a “Cease-and-Desist Demand” letter dated November 3, 2009, that Canopy used KPMG’s name without KPMG’s authorization and consent. Further, KPMG told Canopy that it: (1) had never been retained nor agreed to audit any of Canopy’s financial statements; and (2) did not issue the audit opinion dated June 29, 2009. KPMG demanded, among other things, that Canopy “immediately CEASE AND DESIST from using the subject report and/or the unauthorized use of the KPMG name….”

It’s seems obvious that KPMG did nothing wrong here but this is still a big bowl of awkward. The firm’s name is all over the complaint and who knows how many other companies are running around with the firm’s letterhead throwing their “audited” financials around.
As we’ve indicated, this may call for a completely new look for KPMG. That means no more blue squares. We realize that’s a horrifying thought but the whole firm may be compromised. If you’ve got suggestions for the look (other than pink) or any thoughts on this snafu, discuss in the comments.
UPDATE: A tiny clarification/correction here: The original post over at Tech Crunch states, “Multiple sources have told us that Canopy was absolutely making up their financial statements, even forging audited statements with fake KMPG [sic] letterhead.” One could get the impression from our post here that genuine KPMG letterhead was used. That does not seem to be the case. The SEC’s complaint states that the audit report was “falsified” or “forged” without mentioning the authenticity of letterhead.
Nevertheless, we still stand by our conclusion that the Firm has no choice to either revisit stationery controls (since it’s obvious you can’t just get the shit anywhere) or change the entire logo as a precautionary measure. Similarly, we will continue to address this particular scandal as “Letterheadgate” to best follow the tradition of any scandal happening in the post-Nixon era to be suffixed with “gate”. We’re done here.
Canopy Complaint.pdf
Canopy Financial Turns Into Sad, Comical Game Of Hot Potato [Tech Crunch]
Earlier: KPMG Will be Stingy with the Letterhead From Now On

(UPDATE) KPMG Will be Stingy with the Letterhead From Now On

Thumbnail image for 200px-KPMG.svg.pngHave you been craving a tech startup accounting scandal? Thought so. Enter Canopy Financial, Inc. who “provides technology-enabled electronic payment, account management, and investment technology platforms for health savings accounts, flexible spending accounts, and health reimbursement arrangements.”
The company was ranked #12 in the 2009 Inc. 500 List of fastest growing companies in America:

In 2008 CEO Vikram Kashyap said his company had 2007 revenues of $9 million. More recently, we’ve heard, the company was saying they’d hit $60 million in revenue and $9 million or so in EBITDA.
All of this may have been lies.
Until recently all the venture capitalists involved proudly placed Canopy Financial on their portfolio pages. Now all trace of the company have been erased from the portfolio pages of investors GGV Capital, Spectrum Equity and Foundation Capital. And their investment bank has erased them from their trophy page as well.
So what happened? Multiple sources have told us that Canopy was absolutely making up their financial statements, even forging audited statements with fake KMPG [sic] letterhead. And somehow the investment bank and all the investors never figured it out.

Jesus, this doesn’t even qualify as cooking the books. This is more along the lines of:

CFO: No, we cannot say $100 kajillion.
CEO: Why?
CFO: Because no one will believe it.
CEO: Why?
CFO: Do you know what a kajillion looks like?
CEO: Um, no.
CFO: It has to look like a real number. I’m saying $59,984,387.
CEO: What about…
CFO: Shut up, that’s the number.

Then all you have to do is get your hands on some KPMG letterhead and BAM your company is listed in a magazine.
We tried contacting KPMG about this but our emails have gone unreturned. We’ll let you know if we hear back from them. In the meantime, if you know anything more about this particular story, enlighten us in the comments.
UPDATE: See the clarification about the authenticity of the letterhead on our post from December 3rd.
Canopy Financial Accused Of Serious Financial Fraud, Investors Burned [Tech Crunch via FINS]

The KPMG Dress Code Now Accommodates Ugly Christmas Sweaters

Ugly Sweaters 130.jpgAt least for one day, anyway.

You’re all acutely aware that many firms are opting to forgo holiday parties this season in favor of charitable activities.

Regardless of your desire — and our sincerest hopes for you — to get cop-slugging drunk on your firm’s dime, the commitment of time to charity is admirable. KPMG is spending an entire day building bears and wrapping them with books. We’re not sure how that will work but whatever.

As an added bonus, we heard that at least one office is attempting to make things more festive:

Picture 4.png

If some of you aren’t able to get behind the celebration of hideous Clark Griswold-esque sweaters for the sake of sport, shame on you. In fact, since the charitable activities are mandatory (as we understand), we’d go so far to suggest that the donning of ugly sweaters should also be mandatory. Judging by many or your fashion proclivities, this will be as easy as opening your closet.

Caption Contest Monday: The King and I

TimFlynn_KingAbdullah.jpg
Background: Tim Flynn talking shop with King Abdullah of Jordan.

Same rules: Submit possible captions in the comments. We’ll choose our favorites — with preference given to those with an accounting/KPMG bent — and then let you vote for the best one.

Memo to TF: If you’ve got a transcript of the convo, feel free to post your favorite highlight as your submission(s).

Rumor Mill: KPMG L.A. Layoffs, Maybe Dallas?

We’ve received multiple reports of layoffs that occurred last week in the audit practice of the Los Angeles office.
The numbers have been described as “a few” and the news has been “hush hush” making us wonder if these cuts were some unfinished business from either the August and September rounds.
There also have been rumors about additional layoffs in Dallas tax but we don’t have any more details than that.
If you’ve got any details for these layoffs or details for other cities, get in touch and discuss in the comments.

More KPMG Leadership Changes

Thumbnail image for Thumbnail image for Thumbnail image for PomeranianSP1324.jpgJust a brief update on KPMG leadership moves that we’ve been following.

Late Friday we learned that the office managing partner (“OMP”) of the New York office has been promoted to serve as the Vice Chair of Market Development. Our understanding is that all the OMPs across the country will report to this position and it will focus on 21 key markets in the U.S.

The former head of the New York Financial Services will move up as the new New York OMP. No word on who will fill the leadership role in NYFS.

This appears to be the first instance where the OMP was promoted to a national position as opposed to a “client-facing role”.

Continue to keep us updated with the latest on the comings and goings of the grand poobahs and discuss your thoughts on the progress of the restructuring in the comments.

Earlier GC coverage of KPMG Leadership Changes and Restructuring:
Another KPMG Shake-Up
KPMG Shake-up Continues
Rumor Mill: KPMG Restructuring Plans
(UPDATE 2) KPMG Atlanta Shake-up Makes Us Wonder

Another KPMG Shake-Up

Thumbnail image for Thumbnail image for PomeranianSP1324.jpgFollowing up on our earlier reports of leadership changes in several cities, — as well as the Southeast region — the Charlotte Business Journal is reporting that John Switzer now sits in the big chair of KPMG’s Charlotte office.
Swizter ascended to the new gig after serving as the managing partner of the Cleveland, Louisville, and Lexington offices.
This appears to be another restructuring switcheroo as Switzer’s predecessor, Paul Chapman, will be “[taking] a new role, serving some of the firm’s largest audit clients.”
As prestigious as that sounds, we’re inclined to believe that the bigwigs decided some fresh blood was needed in Ken Lewis land.
If you’ve got any news on freshly minted grand poobahs in your office, kindly pass along the details and feel free to speculate on the progress of the restructuring in the comments.
KPMG names managing partner [Charlotte Business Journal]