Carillion tribunal: Former KPMG staff turn on each other [The Guardian] The former KPMG partner in charge of auditing Carillion’s accounts before its collapse has blamed his more junior colleagues for misleading regulators, as former team members turned on each other during a tribunal hearing allegations against the firm and six individual auditors.
Looking abroad: As accounting firms struggle to find workers, more and more are expanding overseas [ROI NJ] With a larger share of accounting firms tapping talent overseas, India-based offshore staffing firm Entigrity reports on its website that it has seen the amount of accounting firms with offshore workers rocket from about 6% before the pandemic to just over 40%.
Inflation is Back! What Should Internal Auditors Do Now? [Audit Beacon] When we think of inflation, our first thoughts are often about ourselves – my groceries, fuel, rent, etc. are going to cost more. Will my salary keep up? This is actually a good perspective to have when assessing potential risks to our organization. Hopefully, you’re not the first in your organization to be thinking about the impact of inflation. Hopefully, too, you will be able to engage management (including risk managers) as part of your assessment/validation of the risks.
AICPA Recognizes CPA Evolution Resource Competition Winners [AICPA] The American Institute of CPAs (AICPA) is pleased to announce the winners of the 2021 CPA Evolution Resource Competition (CERC) Awards. This competition seeks to promote the development of teaching resources for the new topics and learning objectives outlined in the CPA Evolution Model Curriculum. The Curriculum was designed to help accounting programs transition to prepare CPA candidates for the Core + Disciplines CPA Exam structure, which begins in 2024.
Profession intensifies diversity efforts with new CAQ initiative [Journal of Accountancy] The Center for Audit Quality (CAQ) announced a strategic initiative Wednesday intended to increase the diversity of the talent coming into the accounting profession while raising awareness of the profession’s diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts.
Our pick for Tweet of the Week out here asking the important questions:
Saw @LindseyStarrett‘s post about an Only Fans client, which made me think of a client one of my old firms had: a dominatrix. THAT was an interesting interview…
So, #TaxTwitter, what’s the most, um, interesting client you’ve had?
— Zbylut on Taxes (@TaxHacker) January 14, 2022
Roku to take part of massive office space left behind by EY in Times Square [Crain’s New York] The team at RXR Realty is breathing a sigh of relief now that television-streaming company Roku is taking over 240,000 square feet of prime office space at its 5 Times Square office tower that had been left behind by longtime tenant EY. The accounting firm, which has occupied the entire 1 million-square-foot building since 2002, moved its offices to the newly-built 1 Manhattan West in July–a big vacancy for 5 Times Square’s landlord to fill in a tricky office market.
New GootLoader Campaign Targets Accounting, Law Firms [Threat Post] Once prolific spreaders of REvil ransomware, the GootLoader malware gang has pivoted to actively targeting employees of law and accounting firms with malicious downloads. The Threat Response Unit from eSentire issued an alert about having over the past three weeks observed GootLoader attacks on three law firms and one accounting firm. WordPress vulnerabilities let the attackers easily hijack sites offering sample business agreements for professionals, the eSentire report explained. The researchers were able to identify more than 100,000 pages with malicious business agreement links set up by GootLoader, with one site having more than 150 pages of content generated by the threat actors.
It’s funny because it’s true:
Accounting industry must take “proactive” approach towards gender equality [AccountancyAge] Findings from the report Top 50 + 50 Accountancy Age report revealed that despite firms leadership remaining predominately male, the percentage dropped from 87 percent to 76 percent in 2020 and that almost half of the people who work in the sector identified as female.
PwC Signs Off Plans to Double Size of its UK Legal Arm [Law.com] Teresa Owusu-Adjei, PwC’s U.K. head of legal, said that the professional services giant’s board has signed off plans that will see a “huge amount of investment” in the firm’s U.K. legal business in the next three to four years. The money will be spent on hiring staff outside of London and investing in new technology to support the legal operation. PwC does not provide figures for its legal revenues, but currently employs around 400 staff in its U.K. legal arm.
Deloitte Launches Unlimited Reality: An Experience and Impact Offering for Virtual Worlds [Cision] Here, have some press release buzzwords: Deloitte’s Unlimited Reality offering helps clients harness next generation strategies, tools, and technologies to create and connect virtual worlds for industrial, workplace, enterprise, and consumer contexts.
Audit chiefs see corporate governance declining [Accounting Today] The American Corporate Governance Index survey, released Tuesday by the Institute of Internal Auditors and the Neel Corporate Governance Center at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville’s Haslam College of Business, found that the number of companies earning A grades in governance dropped to 14% in 2021 from 19% in 2020. The average ACGI score for U.S. companies in 2021 stayed at a B- but dipped to 81 on a 100-point scale, down from 82 in 2020.
Two Local Accounting Firms Merge With Herbein + Company [The Sanatoga Post] No one else beyond their local rag is gonna write this one up soooo… congrats itty-bitties, you made the national news!
Photo by Gilberto Reyes
