Reporting on the Annual Report

Annual reports provide an important source of information for investors. The SEC guidance to companies that requires forward-looking discussions of events is far from uniform but a constructive step in providing information

Measuring the Incremental Learning Achieved with Computer Enhanced Instruction

There has been increasing pressure by the AACSB on accounting educators to include the use of computers as an instructional tool in the 1980s with the advent of separate accreditation for accounting programs. In response, researchers have sought to study student attitudes and report on software available for classroom uses. From the educational perspective, however, the most important type of research would be that which would evaluate the impact of the computer on the level of learning achieved by the student or would indicate sensitivity to the computer enhanced instruction (CEI). The focus of this paper is to suggest a research design to evaluate the computer\u27s contribution to achievement in Accounting education in a model which will also examine the potential effects of confounding variables

Are Electronic Data Bases a Viable Audit Research Tool? Practitioners\u27 Perceptions and Recommendations

An exciting new service for the practicing audit professional is the creation of financial data bases usable for electronic research. Over the past ten years, service companies have compiled data bases of financial data and other information. Service companies make their products available through subscription to clients who want easy and instant access to data which be helpful in the decision making process. All of the Big 8 accounting firms are now subscribers to one of more of these services. They, in turn, provide access to their local offices where telephone communication facilities permit. In an attempt to determine what use is made of public access data bases in the auditing process, the authors conducted a national survey of 469 offices of Big 8 firms. The results of the survey and some suggestions for practitioners which surfaced in the responses are discussed in this article. First, to provide some basic background, a general discussion of the most often used data bases and their contents follows

The FASB Approach to Income Determination: Is It Viable?

A question which has been debated by the accounting profession for decades is whether there exists a single set of correct rules for use in reporting \u27true income\u27 which would enable comparability in reporting for all firms to be achieved. Those who believe a \u27true income\u27 figure does exist, advance their position by attempting to reduce choices among alternatives. Not infrequently the debate centers around the matching principle, i.e., the timing of recognition of an expense. Accounting has its basis in the accrual system. It does not necessarily convey cash inflows and outflows of the current period so much as it seeks to serve as a predictor of future cash flows. Matching expense via systematic and rational allocation to related revenues when they are realized is appropriate and acceptable in the accrual system. Thus the question often arises as to whether management should capitalize a given item with amortization over a specified life or whether management should charge the entire item to income for the current period (immediate recognition). This argument is characterized as the debate over existence of a \u27true income\u27 figure on a per year basis

SINO-FOREST CORPORATION: THE CASE OF THE STANDING TIMBER

The Sino-Forest Case provides a real-world example of financial misstatement and audit failure.2 The case encompasses related parties, auditing procedures for tangible assets, and internal controls. Sino-Forest Corporation was engaged primarily in the purchase and sale of standing timber in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The principal executive office was in Hong Kong and its securities were traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange until 2011. The management of Sino-Forest created a complex web of subsidiaries and related entities whereby it controlled the purchase and sale of standing timber in widely dispersed regions of the PRC. Sino-Forest personnel created false documents related to these transactions, which were materially misstated in the company’s financial statements. Sino-Forest auditors failed to properly recognize and deal with these misstatements, despite concerns expressed by members of the audit team about a lack of evidence regarding the standing timber assets. As a result of these problems, the company was delisted from the Toronto Stock Exchange and is now defunct

Big GAAP/Little GAAP: Will The Debate Ever End?

There has been an ongoing debate for decades, especially since the inception of the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB), over the appropriate application of generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) to private companies. This so-called ‘Big GAAP vs. Little GAAP’ debate has now come to a crisis point. The Financial Accounting Foundation (FAF) has taken a position that is contrary to the recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Panel on Standard Setting for Private Companies (the Panel) presented in January 2011, despite having been represented on the Panel. The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA), also represented on the Panel, has responded by taking a strong stand in favor of the Panel’s position and against the new FAF recommendation and Invitation to Comment, published on October 4, 2011. Additionally, the International Accounting Standards Board has developed a set of reporting standards for small and medium size enterprises (IFRS for SMEs) that has not been recognized in the US. In this paper, we examine the history of the Big GAAP/Little GAAP debate in the US and internationally. We find substantial support for reducing requirements of private companies and recommend that International Financial Reporting Standards for Small to Medium-Sized Enterprises (IFRS for SMEs) be used for public companies of all sizes to be consistent with standards that have been accepted globally

Chronicles of Oklahoma

Necrology section from Volume 30, Number 2, Summer 1952. It includes documents honoring the lives of Paul Nesbitt, Mrs. Jasper Sipes, Marion Riley Tittle, and Clinton Riley Strong

Electron Scattering from High-Momentum Neutrons in Deuterium

We report results from an experiment measuring the semiinclusive reaction 2H(e,e′ps) in which the proton ps is moving at a large angle relative to the momentum transfer. If we assume that the proton was a spectator to the reaction taking place on the neutron in deuterium, the initial state of that neutron can be inferred. This method, known as spectator tagging, can be used to study electron scattering from high-momentum (off-shell) neutrons in deuterium. The data were taken with a 5.765 GeV electron beam on a deuterium target in Jefferson Laboratory\u27s Hall B, using the CEBAF large acceptance spectrometer. A reduced cross section was extracted for different values of final state missing mass W∗, backward proton momentum →ps, and momentum transfer Q2. The data are compared to a simple plane wave impulse approximation (PWIA) spectator model. A strong enhancement in the data observed at transverse kinematics is not reproduced by the PWIA model. This enhancement can likely be associated with the contribution of final state interactions (FSI) that were not incorporated into the model. Within the framework of the simple spectator model, a “bound neutron structure function” Feff2n was extracted as a function of W∗ and the scaling variable x∗ at extreme backward kinematics, where the effects of FSI appear to be smaller. For ps \u3e 0.4 GeV/c, where the neutron is far off-shell, the model overestimates the value of Feff2n in the region of x∗ between 0.25 and 0.6. A dependence of the bound neutron structure function on the neutron\u27s “off-shell-ness” is one possible effect that can cause the observed deviation

Beam-Helicity Asymmetries in Double-Charged-Pion Photoproduction on the Proton

Beam-helicity asymmetries for the two-pion-photoproduction reaction ⃗p → p π+π- have been studied for the first time in the resonance region for center-of-mass energies between 1.35 and 2.30 GeV. The experiment was performed at Jefferson Lab with the CEBAF Large Acceptance Spectrometer using circularly polarized tagged photons incident on an unpolarized hydrogen target. Beam-helicity-dependent angular distributions of the final-state particles were measured. The large cross-section asymmetries exhibit strong sensitivity to the kinematics and dynamics of the reaction. The data are compared with the results of various phenomenological model calculations, and show that these models currently do not provide an adequate description for the behavior of this new observable

Aglite Lidar: A Portable Elastic Lidar System for Investivating Aerosol and Wind Motions at or Around Agricultural Production Facilities

The Aglite Lidar is a portable scanning lidar that can be quickly deployed at agricultural and other air quality study sites. The purpose of Aglite is to map the concentration of PM10 and PM2.5 in aerosol plumes from agricultural and other sources. Aglite uses a high-repetition rate low-pulse energy 3-wavelength YAG laser with photon-counting detection together with a steerable pointing mirror to measure aerosol concentration with high spatial and temporal resolution. Aglite has been used in field campaigns in Iowa, Utah and California. The instrument is described, and performance and lidar sensitivity data are presented. The value of the lidar in aerosol plume mapping is demonstrated, as is the ability to extract wind-speed information from the lidar dat