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Friday Footnotes: PwC Thinks You Miss Your Office Friends; KPMG Clients Kept Tax Dodging; Deloitte and Diversity | 6.4.21

Wealthy KPMG clients continued to dodge taxes for years after CRA detected offshore ‘sham’ [CBC] The KPMG scheme involved setting up shell companies for Canadian multimillionaires and billionaires in the Isle of Man, a British crown dependency in the Irish Sea. A client would purport to give away their wealth to one of the shell companies and then get back regular tax-free “gifts” from income earned when the money was invested abroad.

New York CPAs Elect First Woman of Color as President of State Society [CPA Practice Advisor] Rumbi Bwerinofa-Petrozzello, CPA, CFF, CFE, Senior Director, Consulting, for Seramount, began her one-year term as president of the New York State Society of CPAs (NYSSCPA) on June 1, making her the 102nd president of the NYSSCPA, and the first woman of color to be elected to the position.

Deloitte’s MADE Commits $75 Million to Fuel Greater Racial and Ethnic Diversity in Tax and Accounting [PR Newswire] Deloitte announced today the establishment of Making Accounting Diverse and Equitable (MADE), a commitment to generate more advisory, auditing, and tax career opportunities and leadership pathways for the next generation of certified public accountants (CPAs). MADE represents a bold vision for the accounting profession, both in terms of increasing racial and ethnic diversity, and helping students of color see and realize their future in business through the prism and possibilities of accounting.

PwC UK senior partner Ellis backs social benefits of office in return to work push [Financial News] PwC is trying to extol the social aspects of office life to entice staff back after more than a year of working from home during the Covid-19 crisis, according to the Big Four firm’s UK senior partner Kevin Ellis.

SEC Awards More Than $23 Million to Whistleblowers [SEC] The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced awards of approximately $13 million and $10 million to two whistleblowers whose information and assistance led to successful SEC and related actions.

Internal Revenue Service Agent Pleads Guilty to Identity Theft and Wire Fraud [Department of Justice] Earlier today, in federal court in Brooklyn, Bryan Cho, also known as “Yong Hee Cho,” a Special Agent with Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation, pleaded guilty to wire fraud and aggravated identity theft in connection with a scheme to create false identification documents and passports using the stolen identity of the former subject of an IRS investigation. The proceeding took place before United States District Judge Ann M. Donnelly. When sentenced, Cho faces up to 22 years in prison and has agreed to forfeit $394,374.63.

The IRS Wants The Stimulus Money Sent To Foreign Citizens And Dead People Back [NPR] After accidentally sending millions of stimulus checks to ineligible foreign citizens living overseas, the IRS is now asking some foreign banks to help it recover that money, creating a legal mess.

GASB addresses accounting changes and error corrections [Journal of Accountancy] GASB proposed changes Tuesday to its accounting and financial reporting guidance for accounting changes and error corrections that has been in effect for more than 40 years.