| COVER
STORY Financial
Reporting and Corporate Disclosure Practices
-- Deepak Ukidave
Financial
Reporting and Corporate Disclosure is one of the key areas which perhaps is the
most contemporary in today's context of Corporate Finance Management. The investors
nowadays expect corporate boards to exhibit total transparency, not only in book
of accounts, but in overall operations of the company by disclosing in their annual
report detailed information on everything. This article attempts to bring out
the extent to which these expectations are met, and also highlights good disclosure
practices of some select companies.
© 2007 IUP . All Rights Reserved
ACCOUNTING
Role
of Professional Accountants in Rural Development by NGOs
-- Ashutosh Verma
In
the present scenario, the focus is on sustainable rural development. Professional
accountants and the institutes of which they are members, need to play a proactive
role to fulfil the requirements of rural development by NGOs. Professional accountants
can play a major role in promoting sustainable rural development as a major strategic
issue of economic development. They can actively influence organizational decision-making
process and external reporting, thereby discharging their responsibility of communicating
and articulating the implications of sustainable rural development debate to various
stakeholders. Due to their association with NGOs as auditors, certification authorities,
financial advisors and consultants, they can influence the decision-making process
of NGOs as far as their accounting and reporting practices are concerned. NGOs
should be made to realize the benefits of transparency, accountability and standard
accounting and reporting practices, which will ultimately improve their public
image and help them generate more funds from various sources for rural development
and ensure its proper utilization.
© 2007 IUP . All Rights Reserved
ACCOUNTING
Fact,
Fiction, and Fair Value Accounting at Enron
-- Robert G Haldeman, Jr.
The article speaks about the SFAS 157 and fair value measurements recently
adopted by FASB to provide guidance on how to measure fair value and `applies'
under other accounting pronouncements that require or permit fair value measurements.
It provides for exceptions such as share-based payment transactions and practicability.
© 2006 The New York State Society of Certified Public Accountants. First published
in The CPA Journal (www.cpahournal.com), November 2006 issue. Reprinted with permission.
AUDITING
The
Auditor's Report
-- Stephen Spector
This
article talks about an exposure draft which revises some sections of The Auditor's
Standard Report Handbook. The objective of this project is to revise standards
and guidance dealing with the standard report of an auditor. The article also
provides guidance for an auditor's report on special purpose financial statements.
© 2006 Stephen Spector. First published in November-December 2006 issue of CGA
Magazine, published by CGA, Canada. Reprinted with permission. TAXATION
Detax
the Dividends
-- Jennifer Smith and Trent Henry
In
an attempt to level the playing field, the feds have put forth their plan to reduce
the income tax rate on certain dividends.
© 2006 CA Magazine. A publication of the Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants,
Toronto, Canada. Reprinted with permission. CORPORATE
GOVERNANCE Corporate
Governance : An Indian Spiritual Perspective
-- Dharminder Singh Ubha
Corporate
governance is basically concerned with promoting corporate fairness, transparency
and accountability. It is essentially a state of mind and a set of principles
based on relationships. Ethical corporate governance is the prerequisite for development
of resilient and vibrant capital markets increasing the confidence of investors
and societal faith. Indian scriptures offer immense wisdom for inculcating values
and ethical norms in the corporate world, which can form the nucleus of corporate
governance by touching their conscience. The article attempts to study the two
major religious scriptures of India, i.e., the Bhagwad Gita and the Guru Granth
Sahib so as to explore values and ethics-based business principles and practices
needed for good corporate governance.
© 2007 IUP . All Rights Reserved
BUSINESS
ENVIRONMENT Accounting
Frauds: Occurrence and Deterrence
-- R Puratchimani
Enron,
WorldCom, Global Crossing, Tyco the list goes on. These companies were once the
best performers in their respective fields. One factor which contributed to the
downfall of these companies was accounting fraud. Irrespective of a company's
competitive advantages, strategies and innovations, if it fails to prevent accounting
fraud, it has to face downfall. This article, discusses different ways to prevent
accounting fraud.
© 2007 IUP . All Rights Reserved
TECHNOLOGY
Is
the Stage Set for ASP Adoption?
-- James Gilbert
The
changing dynamics of the financial services industry and developments in technology
could mean that the ASP model is finally ready to take off.
© 2006 James Gilbert. This article was originally published on www.gtnews.com
in October 2006 issue. Reprinted with permission. TECHNOLOGY
Reaching
Compliance Through Foundational IT Controls
-- Dwayne Melancon
Effective
use of key IT controls or foundational IT controls is necessary to provide cost-effective
risk management for the organization.
© 2006 Dwayne Melancon. This article was originally published in ITAudit, Volume
9, December 2006, by The Institute of Internal Auditors Inc.(www.theila.org/itaudit).
Reprinted with permission. RESEARCH
PAPER Determinants
of Environmental Disclosure : A Study of Indian Companies
-- Ravi Inder Singh
Haphazard
use of natural and environmental resources on the part of industrial sector has
caused it to face a lot of criticism and strict government and non-government
surveillance. To legitimize their existence, industrial houses, in the absence
of comprehensive mandatory disclosure guidelines, have voluntarily started providing
environmental information to the public mainly through their annual reports. But
the level of environmental reporting i.e., structure of reporting, contents of
report and the extent of environmental information provided varies substantially
from company to company. In this article, analysis of samples of annual reports
of the top 200 Indian companies has been done to examine the factors affecting
the level of corporate voluntary environmental disclosure.
© 2007 IUP . All Rights Reserved
SPEECH
Speech
by SEC Chairman : The Promise of Interactive Data
-- Christopher Cox
The
speech helps understand the intersections of technology and investing, and the
need of XBRL-US to document every taxonomy necessary to produce financial statements
for any industry using US GAAP.
© 2006 US Securities and Exchange Commission (www.sec.gov). Speech by Christopher
Cox, Chairman, US Securities and Exchange Commission, 14th International XBRL
Conference, delivered on December 5, 2006 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Repinted
with permission. BOOK
REVIEW Financial
Intelligence : A Manager's Guide to Knowing What the Numbers Really Mean
-- Karen Berman and Joe Knight with John Case Reviewed by Prof. Malathi Srinivasan
In
Financial Intelligence, the authors believe that if everyone in a company really
understands how financial success of a firm is measured and how it impacts a company's
performance, then everyone does better. This understanding is what they term as
`Financial Intelligence' and present the essentials of finance in this book. On
the practical side, after reading the book, readers will be able to speak the
language of finance, ask questions when looking at financial reports and analysis,
as well as use the information to see the linkage between financial results and
decision-making.
© 2007 IUP . All Rights Reserved |
