Remaining independent while advising on revenue recognition

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2019/dec/auditor-independence-while-advising-on-revenue-recognition-201922520.html

PWC document on changes in auditing estimates

https://www.pwc.com/us/en/cfodirect/publications/in-depth/pcaob-auditing-estimates-impact-to-management.html

PCAOB Inspection Focus -2020

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2019/dec/pcaob-inspection-focus-2020-audit-quality-tips-201922630.html

Critical Audit Matters and estimates

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2019/dec/how-critical-audit-matters-relate-to-critical-accounting-estimates.html

2019 audit standards at a glance

https://www.aicpa.org/interestareas/frc/auditattest/auditing-standards-information-and-resources.html

Critical Audit Matters

https://www.jamesrpeterson.com/home/2019/12/critical-audit-matters-ii-the-games-are-on.html This partial quote at end of piece highlights the tradeoffs A Goldilocks strategy emerges—firms will identify two CAMs at least, maybe three at most. Those numbers avoid the tail risks – too many or too few – while the inspectors can be entangled in extended discussions, over competing priorities and resources, the interest level and reading tolerance of investors, and the length and complexity of audit reports. The gaming of that process and the accompanying negotiations can be prolonged until all players are cross-eyed with boredom and fatigue. The result? Three or four years from now, a bright young PhD candidate will have an assured research topic and a glide-path along the tenure track, by compiling experiences under the rubric, “Who ever thought CAMs were a good idea?”

Corporate Boards

https://www.fm-magazine.com/news/2019/nov/corporate-board-refreshment-201922350.html

Audit Committee

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2019/nov/how-audit-committees-can-improve-disclosure-201922381.html

CPA ethics framework

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/issues/2019/nov/cpa-ethics-compliance-framework.html

Things that keep you from

The automatic things you do are basically those things that keep you from doing the better things you need to do. Bill Murray, actor

SEC replaces PCAOB Board member

https://www.accountingtoday.com/news/sec-replaces-pcaob-board-member-with-white-house-aide-rebekah-goshorn-jurata

ICAEW panel on re-imagining the audit

https://auditfutures.net/articles/aaa-reimagining-audit ICAEW hosted a panel session for the 2019 Annual Conference of the American Accounting Association. The session once more created the space to step back and reflect on where the profession should be going – by offering various perspectives to challenge us to think differently about the future of audit. We engaged two highly respected accounting professors and journal editors- Robert Knechel (University of Florida) and Mark Peecher (University of Illinois) and two practicing auditors from the Bay area – Berhta Minnihan (audit partner from Moss Adams) and Wilmie Vosloo (audit manager from BDO).

Former KPMG Executive Pleads Guilty in ‘Steal the Exam’ Scheme

https://cfo.cmail19.com/t/d-l-xjddrit-yhihojiw-b/ Britt's case is separate from the others. Sentencing set for May 2020.

Research on rule to identify audit partner

https://www.wsj.com/articles/rule-to-identify-audit-partners-doesnt-improve-audit-quality-11568838331

Audit Quality - Australia

https://www.intheblack.com/articles/2019/10/01/seeing-audit-quality-in-australia-in-a-new-light

Critical Audit Matters

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2019/oct/cpa-firm-reporting-critical-audit-matters-201921907.html

Revenue Recognition and Starbucks

https://www.wsj.com/articles/sec-questions-starbucks-about-revenue-recognition-policy-11568066841?mod=djemCFO

Bribery red flags

https://www.fm-magazine.com/news/2019/sep/bribery-risk-red-flags-201921561.html

Materiality

https://www.aicpa.org/content/dam/aicpa/interestareas/frc/assuranceadvisoryservices/downloadabledocuments/exposuredrafts/materiality-discussion-paper.pdf How do you set materiality in an attestation engagement where subject matter cannot be quantitatively measured? A new AICPA discussion paper highlights ways practitioners might navigate these challenges. If you have practical experience in this area, read the draft and share your feedback by Oct. 31.

SEC and internal controls

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-sec-threatens-to-go-soft-on-internal-controls-11566158647

GE and fraud?

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/ge-plunges-after-whistleblower-calls-it-a-bigger-fraud-than-enron/ar-AAFQjYf?ocid=se


https://www.wsj.com/articles/ge-is-new-target-of-madoff-whistleblower-11565866617?mod=djemCFO


https://www.gefraud.com/

Non-Accounting Grads

From the CFO Journal's Morning Ledger on August 13, 2019 Accounting Firms Increasingly Hire Non-Accounting Graduates For many public accounting firms, a prospective new hire’s technology skills have become more relevant than their accounting knowledge, according to a report from the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. Non-accounting graduates comprised 31% of all new-graduate hires in public accounting in 2018, up 11 percentage points from when it was last tracked in 2016, according to the organization. The proportion of non-accounting graduates hired was larger than that of new hires with a master’s degree in accounting (25%), but smaller than that of hires with a bachelor’s degree in accounting (43%) in the 2017-18 school year, the study said. The report, released every two years, found that total projected enrollment for accounting programs—either bachelor’s, master’s or doctoral degrees—fell 4% to 241,873 since the 2015-16 school year. The 2014-15 and 2015-16 school years saw the highest enrollment—both about 253,000—since the organization began tracking it in 1993.

Finding too many material weaknesses

https://www.wsj.com/articles/companies-appear-to-avoid-hiring-auditors-with-a-history-of-critical-audits-new-research-shows-11565647355?mod=djemCFO Companies Appear to Avoid Hiring Auditors With a History of Critical Audits, New Research Shows Audit committees need to do more to prevent companies from acting on bias, according to researchers who examined data from more than 350 U.S. audit firms over 13 years

Jail for KPMG cheater

https://economia.icaew.com/news/august-2019/first-of-the-kpmg-cheats-jailed

Cognitive biases and audit quality

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/issues/2019/aug/biases-jeopardize-audit-quality.html

AICPA issues forensic accounting standards

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2019/jul/forensic-accounting-aicpa-standards-201921580.html

U.K.Audit Regulator Change

The U.K. government named a new chief executive for the Financial Reporting Council a move that comes as the audit and accounting watchdog prepares for a wide-ranging overhaul amid concerns about its effectiveness, CFO Journal’s Nina Trentmann reports. Jonathan Thompson, the CEO of HMRC, the U.K.’s tax office, will leave his current job to take the FRC role at a time of substantial change for the regulator. The FRC will become part of a new statutory body called the Audit, Reporting and Governance Authority, a new watchdog that will be tasked with setting and enforcing standards for corporate reporting, audit and governance. https://cfo.cmail19.com/t/d-l-pullldy-yhihojiw-m/

SOX compliance

https://www.cfo.com/regulation/2019/07/sox-compliance-doesnt-get-easier-with-time/

Internal audit

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/issues/2019/jul/internal-audit-research.html

Audit report

https://blog.aicpa.org/2019/07/5-things-you-need-to-know-about-the-new-auditor-reporting-standards.html#sthash.IjaGqPEB.dpbsaudit

Internal Control Evaluation

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/issues/2019/jul/evaluating-internal-control.html

Standard opinion & going concern

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3374039

KPMG

https://www.wsj.com/articles/kpmg-to-pay-as-much-as-50-million-to-settle-sec-probe-11560474967?mod=djemCFO

Audit firm problems

https://www.cfo.com/auditing/2019/06/audit-firms-problems-are-also-cultural

Fraud Stories

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/podcast/real-fraud-stories-kelly-richmond-pope.html

AI skils

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/issues/2019/jun/critical-cpa-skills-for-ai-powered-world.html

AI in auditing

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/issues/2019/jun/artificial-intelligence-in-audit.html

Fraud quiz for small buisness

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/issues/2019/jun/fraud-iq-quiz-small-business.html

Audit quality Infographic

https://www.aicpa.org/content/dam/aicpa/eaq/eaq-highlights-report-2018-infographic.pdf

PCAOB Guidance on CAMs

https://pcaobus.org/Standards/Documents/Implementation-Critical-Audit-Matters-Deeper-Dive-Communication-of-CAMs.pdf The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board staff published new guidance on Critical Audit Matters, or what the auditor found most difficult or challenging when reviewing a company’s books. The U.S. audit regulator adopted rules requiring expanded auditor reports in 2017, with auditors required to start submitting the revamped and expanded reports this year for larger companies for fiscal years ending on or after June 30.

Technology risks for auditors

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2019/may/assessing-technology-risks-tips-for-auditors-201921212.html

Audit Data Analytics

https://blog.aicpa.org/2019/05/5-steps-to-get-started-with-audit-data-analytics.html#sthash.X6fJWJUC.dpbs

Changes in AICPA audit reporting

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2019/may/asb-enhances-communication-in-auditors-reports-201921143.html

Judgments in reporting CAMs

https://www.cpajournal.com/2018/02/19/cam-versus-kam-distinction-without-difference/

Standard setter discussion

https://www.cpajournal.com/2019/02/21/regulators-and-standards-setters/ Addresses KAMs and CAMs....and other standard setting issues

Scammers target ACH transactions

http://www.cfo.com/fraud/2019/04/scammers-target-ach-transactions/

Why Do Some People Commit Fraud? Psychologists Say It's Complicated

https://www.forbes.com/sites/sarahwatts/2019/03/21/the-psychology-behind-scamming/#1def55643447

Stopping rules for sufficiency of audit evidence

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3341726 When Enough is Enough: The Use of Stopping Rules in Auditor Determinations of Evidence Sufficiency The four stopping rules for design problems identified by Browne and Pitts (2004) are magnitude threshold, mental list, difference threshold, and representational stability. The magnitude threshold rule posits that an individual maintains a mental calculation of the cumulative impact of all evidence gathered and will stop when the sum of the evidence surpasses a predetermined amount. The mental list rule posits that a person has a set of criteria in their mind against which they asses the sufficiency of information collected. The difference threshold rule posits that a person evaluates the incremental value of the most recent item obtained and stops searching for additional information when no longer learning anything new. The representational stability rule posits that a person continues to collect information as long as the new information adds something to their mental model of the problem.

Critical audit matters report guidance

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2019/mar/pcaob-insight-on-critical-audit-matters-201920822.html Significant changes to the audit report - most significant in 70 years. PcAOB provides some guidance

Sentencing related to fraud scheme

https://www.justice.gov/usao-ma/pr/boston-woman-sentenced-27-million-bank-fraud-scheme

A copy of Father Pacioli's Summa for auction

https://www.foxbusiness.com/personal-finance/luca-paciolis-1494-book-on-business-accounting-could-fetch-1-5m-at-auction

Grant Thornton partners suspended

https://goingconcern.com/grant-thornton-current-and-former-partners-will-have-a-seat-in-the-pcaobs-penalty-box/

Blockchain - trust it or not?

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/612974/once-hailed-as-unhackable-blockchains-are-now-getting-hacked/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/enriquedans/2019/02/22/blockchain-back-to-the-drawing-board/#64d6c6f42e15

https://na.theiia.org/news/Pages/New-Tone-at-the-Top-Discusses-Blockchain-Technology-and-its-Enormous-Potential-to-Transform-How-Businesses-Operate.aspx

Jeffrey Skilling released from prison

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/22/business/enron-ceo-skilling-scandal.html

AICPA's ASB aligns select standards with PCAOB

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2019/jan/aicpa-asb-changes-align-gaas-with-pcaob-standards-201920332.html

Are you able to call yourself CPA - the State matters!

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/newsletters/2019/feb/check-cpa-status.html

DOD disclosure requirements of auditor investigations

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-04/is-your-auditor-being-investigated-new-law-may-expose-misdeeds The Defense Department will soon force accounting firms it hires to disclose investigations they face... The directive was slipped without notice into last August’s $716 billion defense bill by Rhode Island Senator Jack Reed. It could have a significant impact on the many accounting firms that bid for auditing and consulting work at the Pentagon.

A critique on Big-4 accounting firms

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/may/29/the-financial-scandal-no-one-is-talking-about-big-four-accountancy-firms

Study using PCAOB data

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3300277

PCAOB inspections in 2019

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2018/dec/pcaob-inspection-focus-2019-201820237.html

Maintaining independence with nonattest service

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/issues/2016/nov/maintaining-independence-with-nonattest-services.html

Critical audit matter disclosures

This article has six tips for developing the Critical Audit Matters disclosures https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2018/dec/critical-audit-matter-disclosures-201820334.html