CFO, The Magazine for Senior Financial Executives articles from September 2007

CFO, The Magazine for Senior Financial Executives archives from September 2007

Sports report.(CFO.com)
September 1, 2007... From Nascar to baseball to college football, CFO has a long history of carefully examining the financial systems that keep players on the field and fans in their seats. Now, we've gathered all of our sports coverage into one place. Check out...

Flipping out?(CFO.com)
September 1, 2007... Want to learn more about IHOP's plan to turn Applebee's around? An expanded version of this issue's interview with IHOP CFO Thomas Conforti appears exclusively at www.cfo.com/ihop. Find out more about Applebee's real-estate sell-off, what...

Most read articles.(CFO.com)
September 1, 2007... 1. Count 'Em: 63 CFOs Convicted in Past Five Years 2. The Insider's Guide To The Future of Financial Reporting 3. What If IFRS Replaced GAAP? 4. Finance in History: Bankruptcy 5. PCAOB Audit of Deloitte Causes Restatement,...

World GAAP?(ACCOUNTING)
September 1, 2007... Will your company soon be reporting using international financial reporting standards? If so, does anyone on your staff know how? How would you reconcile them with your taxes? Fortunately, the Securities and Exchange Commission started asking...

Holding the ball.(from the editor)
September 1, 2007... "ROUND AND ROUND and round it goes, where it stops nobody knows." Remember that game? Remember what happened if you were caught holding the ball when the rhyme ended? These days, many companies are reluctant participants in a real-life...

From great to boring in no time.(letters)(Letter to the editor)
September 1, 2007... If Nascar thinks things are going south now, just wait ("A Wild Ride," August). The Car of Tomorrow and the Spec Motor that will be the engine of tomorrow will leave GM, Ford, and Dodge with no identity at all. What Nascar has created is a...

Incorrect tax perspective.(letters)(Letter to the editor)
September 1, 2007... Your article "Lessons in Sitting Pretty" (Your Money, August) suggests that "employees can significantly reduce that tax hit by holding the stock for at least a year after exercising the option; the resulting proceeds are then taxed at the 15...

Disappointment in Sarbox.(letters)(Letter to the editor)
September 1, 2007... The investing public is sorely disappointed in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act ("Five Years and Accounting," July). It promised jail time of up to 20 years and fines of up to $20 million for executives who sign off on materially false financial...

Measuring nonfinancial metrics.(letters)(Letter to the editor)
September 1, 2007... Your excellent article "Measuring Up" (June) points out what, in my opinion, is the basic shortcoming of current accounting and reporting systems: focusing on measuring the tangible rather than the [truly] valuable assets. Every company...

Where's the dock?(letters)(Letter to the editor)
September 1, 2007... Surely the Sony Vaio laptop's size and performance are impressive, but my frustration has been with the lack of a reasonable docking station (In Tech, June). The Vaio screen is too small for regular desktop use, and I think most traveling...

Mend the GAAP.(ACCOUNTING)
September 1, 2007... IS THERE A DIRECT LINK BETWEEN the complexity of the current financial reporting system and the large number of restatements among public companies? That was the major question hovering over the first meeting of a committee charged with...

Fraud by the numbers.(ENFORCEMENT)
September 1, 2007... THIS YEAR MARKS NOT ONLY THE FIVE-YEAR ANNIVERSARY of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act but the same milestone for the President's Corporate Fraud Task Force. Announced in July 2002, the task force is chaired by Deputy Attorney General Paul J. McNulty and...

Matchmaker, matchmaker: exp. CFO seeks lg. co. bd. post, pos. Audit com. assmt. I enjoy travel, conversation, and long walks on the beach.(GOVERNANCE)(Brief article)
September 1, 2007... OK, scratch that last sentence, but the first part is no fantasy. Nasdaq has unveiled a new way for companies and finance executives to hook up over open board seats and possibly make long-term commitments. Launched in June,...

Battling for the boardroom.(SEC)
September 1, 2007... THE DEBATE OVER SO-CALLED proxy access is intensifying as shareholder activists and pension funds push for the right to nominate directors even as business lobbyists counter that granting that right could create boards that are beholden to...

The sense of recognition.(CREDIT)
September 1, 2007... EVEN AS THE FINAL RULES CONTAINED in the Credit Agency Reform Act of 2006 were being adopted in June, the subprime-mortgage meltdown was under way, offering an Enronesque reminder of how credit-rating agencies sometimes fail to sound adequate...

Survey says fix Fx.(TREASURY)
September 1, 2007... YOU MIGHT EXPECT THAT AS U.S. CORPORATIONS become increasingly global, they quickly develop effective systems to manage foreign currency exposure. They don't, at least according to Fx software vendor FIREapps. Foreign exchange (Fx) is a...

The high cost of clean data.(BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE)
September 1, 2007... WITH SEVERAL STUDIES over the past three years showing that chief information officers regard business intelligence as their top priority, you might expect a stronger CFO-CIO relationship to be close at hand. But a recent Accenture survey found...

Social studies.(NETWORKING)
September 1, 2007... SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES aren't just for Generation Y anymore. Increasingly, companies are finding them invaluable for recruitment, retention, and even for landing new business. Many companies already use such popular social networks as...

Back to the big eight? Five years after Sarbanes-Oxley, smaller auditing firms are catching up with the Big Four.(by the numbers)
September 1, 2007... IN THE 1980s, eight firms dominated public accounting. Mergers reduced them to the Big Six, then the Big Five. The demise of Arthur Andersen ushered in the era of the Big Four. Throughout this period the so-called second-tier firms struggled to...

View from Europe: friendly, but not friends--such is the relationship between France's new President and CFOs.(top line)
September 1, 2007... YOU COULDN'T HELP BUT BE PUZZLED by the timing. Just as France's new finance minister, Christine Lagarde, called on the nation to "stop thinking, start working" in a July speech, her countrymen were packing their bags to begin their annual...

Software as a serpent: renting business applications may be all the rage, but it can also come back to bite companies.(in tech)
September 1, 2007... GARTNER ANALYST ROBERT Desisto recently predicted that by 2011 fully a quarter of new business software will be delivered as a service. That's a startling percentage given that the current generation of on-demand software has been around for...

2050 foresight: prognosticators of all stripes agree: economic reality will undergo a seismic shift.(insight)
September 1, 2007... JUST FOR FUN, LET'S TURN AWAY FROM THE troubles of the present--the meltdown of the subprime mortgage sector, the volatility of the stock market, the cratering of hedge funds--and look to the horizon. What is the world going to look like in...

Premiums without peril: while bidding high to beat rivals for a target can be an acquirer's undoing, some have developed valuation tools to help them safely offer more.(deals)
September 1, 2007... SOME CALL IT "THE WINNER'S CURSE." When two or more parties vie for a company, one bidder sharply overestimates the value of the target--perhaps reflecting its desire to send rivals home empty-handed. But as the victor begins to assimilate its...

IHOP's Thomas Conforti.(ON THE RECORD)(Interview)
September 1, 2007... TALK ABOUT WORKING UP AN APPETITE: In July, IHOP International announced its intention to buy Applebee's International in an all-cash deal worth $2.1 billion. Between engineering the deal and maneuvering through a gauntlet of press and investor...

Back to school: innovation in retail may start with the customer, but finance offers some new lessons.(Cover story)(Company overview)
September 1, 2007... Teens chattering their way into Abercrombie & Fitch stores for back-to-school clothes this year were greeted by two things: the iconic retailer's heavily stylized decor--dark lighting, wood-shuttered windows, pulsing music--and, with few...

Critical condition: Tenet healthcare has been laid low by scandal, fraud, and cash-draining litigation. can new CFO Biggs Porter help cure the ailing hospital operator?
September 1, 2007... On June 6, 2006--D-Day, appropriately enough--Biggs Porter addressed the troops. Standing in a crowded meeting room in Dallas, the new CFO of embattled hospital chain Tenet Healthcare Corp. outlined his expectations for the finance department...

Chinese checking: what companies really think about the wave of defective products from China.
September 1, 2007... IS IT REALLY WORTH IT? From tainted pet food, seafood, and toothpaste to unraveling tires, exploding cell-phone batteries, and lead-painted children's toys, defective products from China are giving U.S. companies second thoughts about the...

The uncertainty principles: FIN 48 may do more than spell out how companies account for uncertain tax positions; it may also make IRS scrutiny a certainty.(spotlight)
September 1, 2007... SUNLIGHT IS SAID TO BE the best of disinfectants," Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis famously said. But that was in 1914, at least a quarter of a century before the invention of sunblock and a growing awareness that too much sunlight can, in...

One for three: should governance, risk management, and compliance be tackled as one problem, or is this a classic case of scope creep?(compliance)
September 1, 2007... THE SARBANES-OXLEY ACT has long had a digital doppelganger. Almost from the day it was announced, and certainly since its Section 404 emerged as a major corporate headache, IT companies have hawked products that promise to ease the regulatory...

At your beck and call: concierge plans offer the kind of health care Michael Moore would love--if it were universal. But are they worth the out-of-pocket expense?(your money)
September 1, 2007... TIRED OF DOCTORS' visits that consist of waiting 45 minutes for a hurried 5-minute conversation? Try the boutique alternative. Also called concierge care or membership-based coverage, these services are becoming increasingly popular despite...

Vice can be nice: companies offer the vice-chair post to CFOs and ex-CFOs as everything from a consolation prize to preparation for the CEO job.(your move)
September 1, 2007... WHEN DICK CHENEY proclaims on Larry King Live that the nation's Vice Presidency is a "weird duck"--for its combination of ceremonial and serious duties--what kind of bird does that make its corporate equivalent, the vice chairmanship? As it...

McDonald.(CFOs ON THE MOVE)
September 1, 2007... Matthew Paull is retiring as CFO of McDonald's at the end of this year to pursue a career in college teaching....

Hershey.(CFOs ON THE MOVE)
September 1, 2007... Bert Alfonso, VP of finance and planning for Hershey's North American Commercial Group, has been named its new CFO. He succeeds David J. West, who was named EVP and COO in January....

Cyberonics.(CFOs ON THE MOVE)
September 1, 2007... Gregory H. Browne is the new CFO at medical-device maker Cyberonics. The former Tatum partner takes the reins from John Riccardi, who served as interim finance chief until resigning in May....

Travelport.(CFOs ON THE MOVE)
September 1, 2007... Travel-services provider Travelport has appointed Marsha Williams as CFO of its Orbitz Worldwide subsidiary. Williams most recently served as finance chief of Equity Office Properties Trust. She succeeds Steve Barnhart, who remains as president...

Paul J. Siracusa retired as CFO of Hertz Global Holdings.(CFOs ON THE MOVE)
September 1, 2007... Paul J. Siracusa retired as CFO of Hertz Global Holdings. Siracusa will be succeeded on an interim basis by VP and treasurer Elyse Douglas....

Sun Capital Partners.(CFOs ON THE MOVE)
September 1, 2007... Private-equity firm Sun Capital Partners has named Robert J. Riesbeck to the CFO post at Marsh Supermarkets. Previously CFO at American Golf, Riesbeck succeeds Douglas Dougherty, who retired in January....

Interdigital.(CFOs ON THE MOVE)
September 1, 2007... Scott A. McQuilkin is the new CFO at wireless-technologies firm Interdigital. McQuilkin most recently served as finance chief with Metavante Lending Solutions. He succeeds Rich Fagan, who is retiring.

Simulating Wall Street.(grapevine)(Brief article)
September 1, 2007... BUSINESS AND FINANCE students are getting the Wall Street experience they've always wanted, but not on Wall Street. Several universities, including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Ohio State, and the University of Texas, have...

Facebook faces the future.(grapevine)
September 1, 2007... When Gideon Yu became CFO of YouTube last September, analysts took it to mean that the high-flying Internet firm was in IPO mode. Instead, Yu oversaw its $1.7 billion sale to the even-higher-flying Google Inc. Now that the 36-year-old has made...