The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has provided small businesses another 1-year delay to comply with Sarbanes-Oxley Section 404 require­ments. Section 404 is the part of Sarbox that requires management to attest to the effec­tiveness of internal controls over financial reporting. “This will help ease the burden on small firms and help encourage more small […]

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In Canada, the Accounting Standards Board (AcSB) has already taken the first steps of conver­gence with inter­na­tional standards by outlining the plan under which publicly accountable enter­prises will transition completely to IFRS. The change will occur over the next 5 years, and the Board expects the changeover process to be complete by fiscal years beginning […]

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The Ontario Securities Commission has launched a probe of Research In Motion’s stock option practices. An OSC spokesperson said the review was launched in early October, which is not long after the company announced it would have to restate past finan­cials because of its options accounting. Another tech company is having diffi­culties with their options […]

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Two terms, “spring-loading” and “bullet-dodging” have reminded me of the tendency in business to put a positive spin on negative practices. Spring-loading refers to the practice of granting options immedi­ately before releasing good news that will likely increase the stock price, resulting in options that are not in the money techni­cally when granted, but are, […]

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Tech companies are the primary focus of the SEC’s recently announced and currently ongoing inves­ti­gation into options dating irreg­u­lar­ities, which makes sense given their proclivity for awarding stock options as part of compen­sation packages with employees. An article in BusinessWeek documents what tech company execu­tives have recently termed a “witch hunt”: Many execu­tives are surprised […]

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