Busy season comes to an end!

I celebrated the end of accountants’ busy season last night with our firm’s annual “tax party”, which was held at a local watering hole and we had an entire section reserved for us. Free drinks and free food, it was a heck of a night. Great way to celebrate a job well done from January through April.

Taxes are due this Monday because April 30 of course falls on a Sunday this year. I’ve had mine done for a few weeks now, waiting on a big refund due to all my carried forward education and tuition tax credits. I need the influx to pay for all the unpaid time off I’ll be taking this summer to study for the dreaded UFE!

Congratulations to my fellow Canadian accountant bloggers and all the accountants out there for making it through!

First day of trading for Corel on the Nasdaq

Corel began trading on the Nasdaq Wednesday, April 26 and finished down 2.1% from its IPO price of $16 per share.

Corel was bought by Vector Capital in 2003, which took it private before offering it publicly again recently. They own 72% after the recent offering. Corel makes CorelDraw and WordPerfect of course (now called bundled with other productivity software and called WordPerfect Office), as well as Paint Shop Pro due to their purchase of Jasc Software in 2004, and also WinZip, as a result of the 2003 Vector acquisition.

The stock is probably going to have limited success, since competition is tight in the mature packaged software industry and no dividends will be paid to the new investors in the company.

The ideal tax system

“The ideal tax system … is neutral to business activity. In such an ideal system, individuals and businesses would base their economic decisions solely on the merits of the transactions, without regard to tax implications. In reality, tax-induced economic distortions are a fact of life, and a more realistic goal is to maximize the occasions when businesses and individuals are guided by economics, and minimize those cases where economic decisions are micromanaged or even dictated by a tax system. Therefore, the most competitive tax systems, and the ones that score best in the SBTCI, are those that create the fewest distortions by enforcing the most simple tax system based on broad bases with low rates.”

This is an excerpt from a great article on simplifying the tax system in ways that don’t automatically mean a flat tax. The tax system’s complexity doesn’t stem from brackets. It is caused by the overabundance of various tax credits and other deductions applicable only to certain groups of people in certain specified situations.

The Dell-Alienware deal, a few weeks later

Dell bought Alienware because they needed to get into the high-end market in a big way. They have given up on trying to crack the market with the Dell brand, which has never been cool and apparently never will be.

Established in 1996 and based in Miami, Florida, Alienware has built their reputation as a provider of powerful machines built for hardcore computer gamers and encased in sleek packages.

Alienware will remain essentially autonomous. Dell … will give Alienware free rein to devise wild designs for the avant-garde using whatever components it chooses. However, Dell will assume responsibility for logistical aspects, such as securing supplies of components and offering more generous financing packages.

Dell will focus on doing what they do best and Alienware will continue to make crazy sweet machines. Seems like the match is going to work out for consumers as well as shareholders.