NYSSCPA Members in the News

Buffalo Chapter Education Night Dinner
Honor Roll (May 22): Recognizing accomplishments of WNYers
The Buffalo News
The Buffalo Chapter of the New York State Society of Certified Public Accountants recently held its annual Education Night Dinner honoring the outstanding junior, senior and graduate students at Western New York colleges and universities. Four D’Youville College accounting students were among those being honored for their academic accomplishments at the event.

Anthony Mangiameli (Rochester)
Importance of financial planning
WROC Rochester First
CPA Anthony Mangiameli of Insero & Company discussed the importance of financial planning Monday on News 8 at Sunrise. Mangiameli said one of the best ways to avoid financial setbacks is to save money. Have a monthly budget that includes expenses, savings and investments.  This will make short term budgets easier to manage and long term goals more attainable.

Other Accounting and Financial News

Intuit and BDO Partner for Small Business Accounting Using QuickBooks
CPA Practice Advisor
Intuit and national accounting and consulting firm BDO USA have formed a strategic partnership through which the firm will use Intuit's QuickBooks for its small business clients. “Like us, BDO is focused on helping small businesses adopt today’s online technologies and streamline processes to fuel their success,” said Jim McGinnis, vice president and leader of Intuit’s Accountant Segment.

Extended Vacancy: On Average, CFOs Take Four Weeks To Fill Finance Positions
CBS8.com
Imagine being without a valuable employee for a month. That's the situation accounting and finance departments typically find themselves in when a member of the team moves on. According to a new survey from Robert Half Finance & Accounting, CFOs said it takes four weeks, on average, to fill an open staff-level accounting or finance position and five weeks to hire for a management-level role.

Airbnb, Others Pay Out Billions Beneath IRS’s Radar, Study Finds
Accounting Today
The IRS has been so slow to adapt to the rapidly emerging peer-to-peer economy that billions of dollars in taxable income a year are probably going unreported every year, according to a study being delivered to Congress this week. More than 2.5 million Americans earned income via on-demand platforms like Airbnb Inc., Etsy Inc. and Lyft Inc. in 2014, and the companies generated an estimated $15 billion in revenues.

Wary Takeover Targets Wrest Fees, Guarantees From Chinese Suitors
Wall Street Journal
U.S. computer distributor Ingram Micro Inc. got more than a handshake in February when it signed a takeover deal with a Chinese conglomerate. It got money in the bank. Ingram received a $400 million deposit in an escrow account located outside China. It will collect that sum if the buyer, a unit of HNA Group, can’t close the deal.

Democrats to fend off GOP attacks at rare hearing to impeach IRS chief
The Washington Post
House Democrats plan to make the case Tuesday that impeaching the IRS chief is a waste of time and would require a full-blown investigation that could not come close to wrapping up by the end of this session of Congress. Outlining their strategy for what’s shaping up as a partisan hearing on four articles of impeachment Republicans have introduced against IRS Commissioner John Koskinen, Democrats say they’ll argue that the tax collector committed no misdeeds as Congress investigated a scandal that predated him.

NYHFR Survey: Hedge Fund Industry Embracing Sustainability Reporting
FINalternatives
Sustainability reporting is increasingly moving from being a fringe issue of concern to only a handful of investors to being a mainstream concern of global importance, according to a new survey by the New York Hedge Fund Roundtable. Amidst growing worldwide concerns about the environmental, social and governance issues that confront businesses and the impact their activities have on their stakeholders, institutional investors are putting greater emphasis on sustainability reporting, the survey found.

AICPA Asks IRS to Cut Fees for S Corp Private Letter Rulings
Accounting Today
The American Institute of CPAs has asked the Internal Revenue Service and the Treasury Department for the IRS to set up a separate user fee category for private letter ruling requests for S corporations, which would result in lower fees for these requests. “The AICPA proposes that the Service establish a separate user fee category for private letter rulings under sections 1362(b)(5) and 1362(f) because these rulings should require significantly less time by IRS personnel than most other ruling requests for which a current user fee of $28,300 is generally charged,” AICPA Tax Executive Committee chair Troy Lewis wrote in a letter last week.

Civil Antitrust Lawsuits Reinstated Against 16 Banks in Libor Case
Wall Street Journal
In a setback for some of the world’s largest financial institutions, a U.S. appeals court on Monday reinstated the private antitrust lawsuits filed against 16 banks for allegedly rigging Libor interest rates. The ruling from the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit reverses a lower court’s decision from 2013, in which U.S. District Judge Naomi Buchwald dismissed the claims because she said the banks’ alleged conduct didn’t violate federal antitrust laws.

U.S. Stocks Slip on Light Volume
Wall Street Journal
U.S. stocks slipped in light trading Monday, with the fewest shares changing hands in nearly two months. A lack of enthusiasm for stocks has plagued the market recently. After a sharp drop and bounceback in the first three months of the year, stocks have plodded along with little fanfare.