Posted on June 19, 2009 at 9:03 AM
Filed under: Accounting Notebook | Best Practices | Corporate Strategy
Tagged: Ernst & Young

Ernst & Young LLP, which cranks out studies almost as fast as Apple does iPods, has just released one on working capital, with a conclusion very much in tune with the times.Up to $1 trillion of much-needed liquidity could be tied up in inventory, receivables and other areas for the...  Continue reading

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Posted on January 15, 2009 at 12:20 PM
Filed under: Accounting Notebook | Deal International | Information Technology
Tagged: ibm corp. , satyam computer services ltd.

This is a period when all kinds of things are getting marked to market -- not just complex securities but also reputations, assumptions and maybe even some inexorable trends that no longer look so inexorable. The last item on the list is occasioned by the news Thursday morning that IBM...  Continue reading

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Posted on January 12, 2009 at 4:03 PM
Filed under: Accounting Notebook | Corporate Strategy
Tagged: cash , georgia tech

Hopefully your company has a high one. The odd but intriguing metric was devised by a couple of researchers at Georgia Tech. As an article at CFO.com explains, it reflects the ability of a company to generate free cash flow while increasing revenue. - Kenneth Klee...  Continue reading

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Posted on January 7, 2009 at 5:19 PM
Filed under: Accounting Notebook | Trends
Tagged: B. Ramalinga Raju , satyam computer

On Dec. 30, when Satyam Computer Services Ltd. seemed merely troubled, we wondered whether strategic and private equity buyers would vie to put money into the Indian outsourcing and computer services company.Now that chairman B. Ramalinga Raju (pictured) has admitted that the company's balance sheet is a fabrication, it doesn't...  Continue reading

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Posted on October 31, 2008 at 12:41 PM
Filed under: Accounting Notebook | Acquisitions
Tagged: fas 157 , key bank

Speaking at an SEC roundtable on Wednesday, Chuck Maimbourg, Key Bank's director of accounting policy, said that FAS 157, the two-year old fair value accounting standard, was the reason his bank scrapped plans to buy another earlier this year. The target's assets were hold-to-maturity loans, according to a report at...  Continue reading

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Posted on August 8, 2008 at 9:39 AM
Filed under: Accounting Notebook | Corporate Strategy | Divesting and Restructuring
Tagged: AOL , Google , Jeffery Bewkes , Time Warner

In December 2005, Google Inc. paid a high premium for a 5% stake in AOL in order to one-up Microsoft Corp. before MSFT got its hands on the Time Warner Inc. unit. Google's $1 billion investment valued AOL at $20 billion. Some analysts have suggested AOL may be worth less than $10 billion now, one ...  Continue reading

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Posted on June 19, 2008 at 12:33 PM
Filed under: Accounting Notebook | Acquisitions | Best Practices | Trends
Tagged: alfred m. king , marshall & stevens , valuation

"What's it worth to us?" -- our June 9 opus on how companies approach the task of valuing acquisition targets -- drew an interesting comment from Alfred M. King, vice chairman at the national valuation firm Marshall & Stevens, who is frustrated by the Financial Accounting Standards Board's definition...  Continue reading

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Posted on May 22, 2008 at 2:45 PM
Filed under: Accounting Notebook | Acquisitions | Research and development
Tagged: accounting , research and development

A new accounting rule that takes effect next year will change the way you have to account for in-progress R&D projects at companies you acquire. There's a good briefing on the topic over at CFO.com....  Continue reading

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Posted on April 25, 2008 at 8:34 AM
Filed under: Accounting Notebook
Tagged: accounting , gaap , ifrs

When it comes to staying on top of accounting rules, I have nothing but good intentions. So when whoever was hogging our newsroom copy of the April CFO Magazine finally returned it to the public pile, I eagerly dove into the cover article on the end of GAAP and the...  Continue reading

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Posted on March 12, 2008 at 10:31 AM
Filed under: 2008 | Accounting Notebook | Jan.-March 2008 | The Magazine
Tagged: DirectTV , FCC , Federal Communications Commission , John Malone , Liberty Media , Newco , News Corp. , Robert Willens , Rupert Murdoch , Sec. 355 , splitoff , tax

News Corp. and Liberty come up with a structure to spin off DirecTV in the most tax-advantaged way possible.  Continue reading

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