IFRS Outlook: Hurry Up and Wait [CFO]
Asked which are the most crucial accounting issues that their companies are facing in 2011, 34% of the 472 CFOs who responded to the question ranked “Convergence to IFRS,” or international financial reporting standards, as number one. Cumulatively, the respondents ranked IFRS convergence higher than any other accounting issue. Yet asked to describe their companies’ “readiness to comply with global accounting standards,” 44.2% said they hadn’t “begun to address convergence,” while 38.8% said they were preparing, “but far from ready.”

Satyam Seeks SEC Approval To Shorten Period of Earnings Restatement [Dow Jones]
Satyam Computer Services Ltd. […] which is recovering from a fraud scandal, is in talks with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to shorten the time frame for which the company would need to restate its earnings under U.S. accounting standards, its chairman said. A restatement of earnings under U.S. accounting standards would be one of the prerequisites for Satyam to be able to relist on the New York Stock Exchange.

Auditors would deflate accounting bubbles [FT]
But it is right for regulators to impose high standards on auditors, who in servicing big quoted companies benefit from what looks suspiciously like an oligopoly. Accountants who habitually let a little air out of inflated asset values could help avert future market crashes. In an old joke, a chief executive asks his slick FD what the profits figure is. “What would you like it to be?” comes the reply. Sceptical auditors would guard against that.

Auditors Abandon Investors On Liability Limits [Forbes]
The Big 4 audit firms have always been preoccupied with significant legal liability in the US. Managing these cases requires exorbitant amounts of the US firms’ time and money. Their international umbrella firms and, in many cases, members firms in other parts of the world are also burdened. It’s my estimate that Big 4 leadership spends 75% of their time on litigation matters.

American Apparel CEO held teen as sex slave: lawsuit [Reuters]
American Apparel Inc founder and chief executive Dov Charney is being sued for $250 million by a woman who said he treated her as a sex slave when she was a teenage sales employee at the clothing chain. Irene Morales of Brooklyn, New York, has accused Charney, 42, of sexual harassment, creating a hostile workplace, gender discrimination and retaliation. American Apparel and directors at the company have also been named as defendants in the lawsuit, filed in a New York state court on Friday. Morales accused them of failing to protect her, and said they knew or should have known that Charney was a “sexual predator.”

Marijuana IPOs Provide Investors With Gateway to Cannabis Boom [Bloomberg]
The legalization of medical marijuana — permitted in at least 15 states — has kicked off a booming economy in ancillary goods. Startups such as Peterson’s GrowOp Technology Ltd. and General Cannabis Inc. (CANA) compare the phenomenon to the California gold rush, when the people making the real money were the ones selling pick axes and shovels. Both companies are planning initial public offerings, part of an effort to remove the stigma from what’s seen as a multibillion-dollar industry.

GM Announces CFO Transition [PR Newswire]
General Motors Vice Chairman and Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell today announced that he will leave the company April 1, 2011, having completed the largest public offering in history and stabilizing the company’s financial operations. Liddell, 52, joined GM in January, 2010 and led the company’s financial and accounting operations on a global basis. “Chris was a major contributor during a pivotal time in the company’s history,” said Dan Akerson, GM chairman and CEO. “He guided the company’s IPO process and established a good financial foundation for the future.”

Rewriting Pension History [WSJ]
Some big companies are changing how they account for their pension plans in a way that could make their earnings look better in coming years. AT&T Inc., Verizon Communications Inc. and Honeywell International Inc. recently ended a longstanding practice in which they “smooth” large gains and losses generated by pension assets into their financial results over a period of years. From now on, these companies will count all such gains and losses in the same year they are incurred.

Cracking the Glass Ceiling From Both Sides [FINS]
Women looking to make it to the C-suite stand a better chance if they can get a boost from other women, according to a new study from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. The study shows that companies with more women on their boards of directors have a greater share of women in top executive positions.

Baucus skeptical of businesses taxed as individuals [The Hill]
“I think the development of pass-throughs has not been helpful to the American economy,” Baucus said after a hearing on tax reform in which witnesses also questioned that arrangement. “I don’t know the solution,” the senator added, “but I think the problem of pass-throughs is concerning.”

BofA CFO: To Cut Long-Term Debt To Near $300B In 2013 From $448B [Dow Jones]
Bank of America Corp. plans on trimming its long-term debt by a further third over the next three years, Chief Financial Officer Charles Noski said, continuing the bank’s goal of shrinking itself to handle new capital ratio requirements. Noski said, in conjunction with slashing long-term debt, the bank plans to keep its total asset level relatively stable through 2013. It will continue to run off assets it doesn’t think are core to its business, with only “modest” increases predicted in certain commercial and consumer loans.

Tchenguizes arrested in Kaupthing probe [FT]
Vincent and Robert Tchenguiz, among the UK’s highest-profile entrepreneurs, have been arrested as part of an investigation into the collapse of Kaupthing, the Icelandic investment bank. Enforcement officers from the Serious Fraud Office and the City of London police made the arrests at about 5.30am on Wednesday, while offices at Rotch Property, the investment vehicle that controls the brothers’ property portfolio, have also been raided.

Americans Oppose Government Shutdown, Fault Cuts in Poll [Bloomberg]
Almost 8 in 10 people say Republicans and Democrats should reach a compromise on a plan to reduce the federal budget deficit to keep the government running, a Bloomberg National Poll shows. At the same time, lopsided margins oppose cuts to Medicare, education, environmental protection, medical research and community-renewal programs.

Dynegy Warns It Likely Won’t Be Able To Comply With Debt Covenants [Dow Jones]
Dynegy Inc.’s auditor, Ernst & Young LLP, expressed substantial doubt that the company will be able to continue as a going concern, as the power producer said it is likely that it won’t be able to comply with some debt covenants in 2011.

How to Be the Ultimate Facebook Troll [Gizmodo]
Because if strange people are going to friend you, you might as well fuck with them.

Hearing set on Koch lawsuit over Internet hoax [AP]
A federal judge will hear arguments next month on whether to quash subpoenas filed by Koch Industries seeking the identities of the environmental pranksters behind a media hoax and bogus website. Wichita-based Koch sued an anonymous group behind a bogus website and fake new release issued in December that falsely announced the company was going to fund more environmentally friendly groups.