CFO, The Magazine for Senior Financial Executives articles from April 2004

CFO, The Magazine for Senior Financial Executives archives from April 2004

Political risk in your supply chain.(Featured In April)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... Whether political perils arise far afield or close to home, the consequences for your supply chain can be catastrophic. Experts in managing political risk believe that planning for contingencies along the entire supply chain can at least...

On trial.(from the editor)(Editorial)
April 1, 2004... TOO MANY MBAs. TOO FEW CONTROLS. TOO MUCH PRESsure from Wall Street. These are just some of the theories bandied about to explain why the CFO was at the scene of so many corporate crimes. Even as the Enron/WorldCom/Tyco trials bring back...

Wrong tax, wrong time.(letters to the editor)(Letter to the Editor)
April 1, 2004... YOUR ARTICLE ABOUT THE PROPERTY taxes paid by business ("Poor Move?" I February) does not mention that real-estate taxes in the United States are so high because they provide the funding for schools. This is a taxation approach used nowhere...

Passage to India.(letters to the editor)(Letter to the Editor)
April 1, 2004... IN YOUR ARTICLE "INDIA INK" (Newswatch, February, page 16), you talk about the growing trend of offshoring structured, repetitive tasks in sell-side investment research to junior analysts in India. This move helps reduce costs while increasing...

California (bad) dreamin'.(letters to the editor)(Letter to the Editor)
April 1, 2004... YOUR "STINGERS" ARTICLE (January) really resonated with me. I'm the CFO of a California high-tech small business in Silicon Valley. We had two very unpleasant experiences in 2003 with respect to California state taxes. 1. The state...

PepsiCo takes on the numbers.(letters to the editor)(Letter to the Editor)
April 1, 2004... IN REVIEWING THE RESULTS FOR PepsiCo Inc. that were presented in "Mind the Gap" (December 2003), we discovered errors in the data used to calculate the Excess Cash Margin. PepsiCo's revenue numbers for 2000 and 2001 are incorrect, as they...

Corrections.(Correction Notice)
April 1, 2004... Due to an editing mistake, the chart in "The Two Faces of Bank Mergers" (New Deals, March, page 32) was incorrect. Union Planters Corp. was acquired by Regions Financial Corp. and Seacoast Financial Services Corp. was acquired by Sovereign...

Thanks, SEC.(newswatch)(United States. Securities and Exchange Commission extends auditing deadline)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... It's rare that companies welcome a ruling from the Securities and Exchange Commission. But recent news that the SEC was extending the deadline for companies to complete audited assessments of their internal financial controls nearly had CFOs...

Bolting from the big four.(accounting firms at loss due to fee structure)
April 1, 2004... WHEN IT COMES TO AUDITORS, MANY COMPANIES ARE apparently deciding that bigger is not necessarily better. Auditor-Trak, a database that follows corporate-auditor changes, reported that in 2003 each of the Big Four accounting firms lost more...

Down to a trickle.(Stock Options)
April 1, 2004... FOUR YEARS AFTER THE NEW ECONomy ran out of gas, are companies finally ready to abandon fixed-price stock options? The impact of expensing, underwater options, and shareholder attempts to block companies from issuing new shares appear to be...

Matched sets.(Tax)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... Companies keep two sets of books--one for financial accounting and one for tax filing. But a new proposal from the Internal Revenue Service would make them synchronize the two sets of numbers. The proposed form, known as Schedule M-3, would...

Hold the recommendation.(Equity Research)(buy, hold, and sell recommendations for stocks being revised)
April 1, 2004... SOME EQUITY RESEARCH HOUSES ARE ditching the standard buy, hold, and sell recommendations for stocks in favor of more-nuanced assessments. On March 1, SG Cowen Securities Corp. announced that it will no longer issue ratings for stocks....

Hearing voices at proxy time.(Investor Relations)
April 1, 2004... The Walt Disney Co.'s annual shareholder meeting this past March made headlines for the unprecedented rebellion of large investors that led Michael Eisner to step down as chairman. But smaller investors had already been debating this topic for...

Go ahead, delist me!(Regulation)
April 1, 2004... USUALLY, GETTING DELISTED FROM A stock exchange is the kiss of death for a company, but these days a few are actually asking to be kicked off. That's because some companies can't afford to abide by the heap of costly new regulations from the...

Slipping through the 'net.(401(K) Plans)
April 1, 2004... Despite the millions of dollars companies have poured into online investment tools, a new study by consulting firm Greenwich Associates reveals that only 35 percent of employees are using them to manage their 401(k) plans. Many employees...

The big sleep: with the economy on the upswing, business managers look to revive IT projects. It's not always easy.(techwatch)
April 1, 2004... IN THE COMPLETELY FICTIONAL MUSEUM OF BUSINESS Technology, the displays are amazing. Down one hall they've got a Quadricycle, down another the original Telex. One wing is devoted entirely to computers. There, Hollerith Desks, Apple Is, and IBM...

Acquired tastes: being CFO on the target end of a deal brings challenges--like having to coach "redundant" staffers.(new deals)
April 1, 2004... IF YOU'RE THE CFO OF A COMPANY BEING ACQUIRED, chances are your salary--and the salaries of your staff--are among the savings promised to shareholders in the wake of the deal. [paragraph] But that doesn't mean you can put your feet up on the...

The doubt of the benefit: voluntary benefits may seem like a win-win. Here's why they could be a lose-lose.(Spotlight insurance)
April 1, 2004... CORPORATE BENEFITS PACKAGES MAY BE SHRINKING, but voluntary benefits are skyrocketing. According to a recent survey, 6 of every 10 companies now offer at least one voluntary, or supplemental, benefit. Employees buy such products--most often...

Squeeze play: forget steroids. It's spending that has baseball in a bind.(Cover Story)
April 1, 2004... It's been called the biggest deal in baseball since the Boston Red Sox sold Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees in 1920. And, as fate would have it, it was the Red Sox who once again let one of the game's best players slip away when the Yankees...

Playing favorites: why Alan Greenspan's fed lets banks off easy on corporate fraud.
April 1, 2004... When the Financial Accounting Standards Board released its exposure draft of new accounting rules for special-purpose entities (SPEs), IN LATE 2002, the nation's financial regulators sent FASB chairman Robert H. Herz decidedly mixed signals....

Malfeasance insurance: how plan sponsors are coping with the mutual-fund scandal.(CFO buyer's guide: 401(k) providers Part 1)
April 1, 2004... THE MUTUAL-FUND industry contends that the fast-spreading allegations of improper trading at fund companies should not worry the approximately 400,000 corporate sponsors of 401(k) plans. But worry they do. [paragraph] That, at least, is...

The promise of Pay-as-you-go IT services.(CFO Research Services)
April 1, 2004... The term "Pay-as-you-go IT services" (PAYG) is not an inherently sexy or dynamic term, but one that holds a great deal of promise and excitement for finance executives and business managers in firms of all types and sizes. The promise inherent...

Monsters Inc.: the security risks unleashed by rogue technology may far outweigh any productivity gains.(Special Report: risk)
April 1, 2004... AT FORRESTER RESEARCH INC., ANALYSTS GET o try out the latest cool technology for themselves: PDAs, Wi-Fi laptops, nifty storage devices. Their jobs also call for reviewing much more mundane technology, like network "sniffing" software and...

Filing ever faster: new deadlines for 10-Ks and 10-Qs have finance departments scrambling. But who will benefit?(regulation)
April 1, 2004... THERE IS A PARADOX AT THE HEART OF the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002. On one hand, the law requires companies to provide more-detailed and more-accurate financial statements. On the other, it cuts the time to do so. As recently as last year,...

The great inflatable service bill: are companies paying too much for services? In the wake of recent billing scandals, CFOs could be forgiven for suspecting that they are.(procurement)
April 1, 2004... IN DECEMBER, PRICEWATERHOUSECOOPERS LLP SETTLED charges that it had overbilled clients by hundreds of millions of dollars by not passing on rebates received from travel agencies (class-action suits against KPMG and Ernst & Young are still...

Bouncing back.(Job Searches)
April 1, 2004... Is this a jobless recovery or what? As economist debate the matter, finance executives are learning firsthand that for them, anyway, opportunities aren't what they used to be. [paragraph] While there are no figures on how many CFOs are...

Deja Judy.(Grapevine)(accusations against Royal Dutch-Shell Group of Cos's Judith Boynton)
April 1, 2004... If recent allegations against Royal Dutch/ Shell Group CFO Judith Boynton are true--that she knew about massive shortfalls in the company's oil and gas reserves two years before they were made public--then, say some, it wouldn't be the first...

Last call?(grapevine)(Chuck Hill dismissed from Thomson Financial/First Call)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... Chuck Hill's insights on the impact of restructurings on corporate earnings were sought by everyone from Congress to CFO magazine. The veteran director of research for Thomson Financial First Call just never expected to experience it firsthand....

T. Rowe Price has named Kenneth V. Moreland CFO.(CFOs on the Move)(Kenneth V. Moreland appointed)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... T. Rowe Price has named Kenneth V. Moreland CFO, succeeding Cristina Wasiak, who stepped down as finance chief in December but has stayed on as a VP.

Hilton Hotels Corp.(CFOs on the Move)(Matthew Hart, Stephen F. Bollenbach appointed)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... ... Hilton Hotels Corp. has named former CFO Matthew Hart president. He takes over one of the jobs held by Stephen F. Bollenbach, who will retain the title of CEO. Bollenbach, also a former CFO, adds the role of co-chairman, which he'll share...

Abercrombie & Fitch Co.(CFOs on the Move)(Susan J. Riley appointed)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... ... Susan J. Riley was named the new CFO of Abercrombie & Fitch Co., succeeding interim finance head Seth Johnson. For more on CFO careers, visit www.cfo.com.

The new CEO: rethinking the corner office.
April 1, 2004... Once a coveted job, being a CEO is not what it used to be. In 2002, nearly 40% of CEO turnover was forced for poor performance, up from 25% in 2001. (1) A CEO appointed in the early 1990s was three times more likely to be fired than a CEO...