Over the years, the peer review process has expanded to cover all forms of attest services (audits, reviews, compilations, and agreed-upon procedures engagements, among others), and now has become mandatory in almost every jurisdiction in the United States.

The chairs of the Financial Accounting Standards Board and the International Accounting Standards Board released an update April 23 on progress by the two boards toward completion of their convergence activities.

In a wide-ranging interview with Bloomberg BNA, Robert Laux, senior director of financial accounting and reporting at Microsoft Corp., laid out the major issues in accounting rulemaking—with a particular focus on their potential impacts on multi-national companies.

A split emerges between financial statement users and preparers in the latest version of the Public Company Accounting Board's proposals for auditor communication whether it should be the auditor's responsibility or management's to detect and report significant unusual business transactions to the audit committee.

The Pension Protection Act of 2006 (“PPA”) gave the Cost Accounting Standards (“CAS”) Board (“CASB”) until January 2010 to bring CAS into compliance with PPA. That did not occur.

The House passed 380-41 and sent to President Obama March 27 a bill intended to boost jobs through enhanced capital formation, but which also contains provisions that dilute the authority of the Financial Accounting Standards Board and the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board.

The role of the Financial Accounting Standards Board would continue to be significant and “very substantive” if the Securities and Exchange Commission adopts international financial reporting standards (IFRS), FASB Chairman Leslie Seidman said in March 12 live webinar.