Financial Accounting Standards Research Initiative

Thanks to everyone who participated in yesterday’s Round Table event. Hope to see you next week. If you’d like more information on this Round Table and Eddie’s research, click here to see the post introducing the topic. Read more > >

A recent Journal of Accountancy article states that the SEC Chief Accountant Jim Kroeker would support the FASB’s cutting the number of convergence projects due for completion in 2011. Here’s one excerpt from that article: “June 30, 2011, is an arbitrary deadline and it’s not one that’s been put in place by the SEC or by [...] Read more > >

Don’t forget about the Round Table discussion tomorrow at 11am ET. You can read more about it here. Hope to see you there. Read more > >

John Cacioppo is one of my favorite authors. He’s here today at the U of Texas, speaking to the business school. I was reading some of his stuff and ran across this and found it to be quite insightful. Although he’s a psychologist, his thoughts speak to any discipline. I guess i [...] Read more > >

   Most bloggers are familiar with lots of examples of accruals management research.  We are also seeing studies on other sorts of financial reporting manipulations, including real earnings management or classification shifting.    The NY Times had an article which discusses the credit rating agencies and their role in the recent financial crisis.  In a move [...] Read more > >

Last week, FASB Chairman Robert Herz submitted a letter to Congressman Barney Frank, Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, and Congressman Spencer Bachus, Ranking Minority Member, regarding accounting rules that were being used (or misused) by Lehman Brothers prior to its bankruptcy in 2008. The letter, which explains the relevant accounting guidance, was [...] Read more > >

According to the Financial Times, the most recent Senate financial regulation bill will require banks to spin off their derivatives operations because “The financial instruments are too inherently risky to be traded by companies benefiting from government guarantees.” Am I missing something? I thought the general bank strategy was to attempt to balance derivative holdings [...] Read more > >

A policy proposal floating around these days is to require banks to issue contingent convertible debt: MY [Mankiw's] favorite proposal is to require banks, and perhaps a broad class of financial institutions, to sell contingent debt that can be converted to equity when a regulator deems that these institutions have insufficient capital. This debt would be [...] Read more > >

The other day, a PhD student here at Texas asked me for an advanced accounting book that had deferred tax coverage in it. She’s a tax person and was wanting to re-fuel her knowledge of this area before she started her summer paper. I laughed and said good luck on that one! [...] Read more > >

On Tuesday, May 4th, 4 pm ET, we will be joined by Tom Selling of The Accounting Onion. Tom will be discussing his opinions of standard setting in general, including fundamental questions regarding recognition, measurement and disclosure. In the process, he will also be providing his thoughts on selected portions of the current FASB/IASB [...] Read more > >