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Footnotes: Madoff’s Loyal IT Guys; GTFO SOTU; No Accounting for China | 01.29.14

Posted on by Adrienne Gonzalez

Madoff IT Guys Wrote Code to Trick Auditors, Jury Told [Bloomberg]

You guys, the State of the Union is sooooo 2000 [NYT]

'Vampire' bank RBS accused of ruining businesses and lives [BusinessZone]

It's totes LOL that Bernanke leaves the Fed with a final screw you guys and your little dollar too [Reuters]

Nintendo plans to buy back quite a bit of stock, cue Mario *game over* music [SF Chronicle]

Here's an article on what you should do as soon as you check into your hotel room for our constantly-traveling, paranoid friends out there [HuffPo]

There's No Accounting for China [WSJ]

Iowa accountant fired after $66K missing from Hawkeye Express The University of Iowa fired an athletics department accountant after auditors projected $66,000 is missing from ticket sales for a popular train that takes fans to the football stadium, a school spokesman said Wednesday. The university fired 31-year employee Kathleen Willier from her $54,000-a-year job on Nov. 6 for failing to follow the school's cash handling procedures and unsatisfactory job performance, spokesman Tom Moore told The Associated Press. [Hawkmania]

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Codification Will Affect You Whether You Like It or Not

Thumbnail image for 128 The Agony - Gethsemane.jpgIn case you’ve forgotten, the new FASB Accounting Standards Codification is all up in your shit since it is effective for all financial statements dated after 9/15/09. One source is already less than enthused about the whole thing:

[From] what I can see it requires you to go through your financials and any place you referenced something like FAS 142 you have to change it to reference one of the like 5,000 topics, subtopics, sections, paragraphs, and subparagraphs within the standard. I think Operating Leases (Lessee) will now be labeled as follows (I am serious): “840-20-a”

After we got the vomit out of our mouths, we realized that this new reference has an uncanny resemblance to IRC referencing but maybe that’s just us. This is especially disheartening for those partners who spent their entire careers committing SFASs, EITFs, and APBs to memory so that they could be the go-to technical accounting wonk. So if that’s you, consider your life’s work completely ruined.
And the PCAOB has kindly reminded you that you get NO SAY in this matter, so just accept it. On the bright side, new associates will be starting or have already so replacing all those references on workpapers should keep them busy chargeable in between making copies and calling/emailing India to check on the cash reconciliations.
This will probably give more than a few of you heartburn this season but some of you may remain clueless about it until the eleventh hour which will make for some excitement. Discuss your excitement/melancholy in the comments.
UPDATE: We had short chat with one Big 4 auditor who summed it up this way, “its fuckin retarded espcially if convergence is happening soon.” Very poignant. Convergence and soon are obviously subjective but the point is duly noted since any sort of global standards would no doubt torch the FASB’s codification.

Stanford CFO to Plead Guilty After Pleading Not Guilty

This after speculation earlier about whether Davis would flip. Looks like he’s going to sing:

James Davis, the former chief financial officer of Stanford Financial Group and who is facing charges related to an alleged $7bn fraud at the group, intends to plead guilty to the three charges against him, his attorney told the Financial Times.
Attorney David Finn, who is representing only Mr Davis, told the FT there would likely be a “procedural not guilty plea” entered at his arraignment, but that his client would ultimately plead guilty to the charges against him “once all the details are worked out.” Mr Davis is due to appear in court in Houston on July 13.

You got that ticket to hell stamped, Stan?
Stanford CFO James Davis “intends to plead guilty”, laywer [sic] says [FT Alphaville]