When you say Health Care Reform, I say tax strategy July 27, 2010 President Obama ushered in a new era for American health care this past March when he signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. A hefty price tag is inevitably attached to such sweeping changes, and to pay for it, Congress has instituted a number of new taxes, fees, cuts, and cost-saving measures. Some high-income [...]
Small businesses make for new faces in the acquisitions game July 13, 2010 Barrels of ink have been spilled over the past two years chronicling the precipitous decline in the M&A marketplace. While the struggles brought on by the global economic slowdown are given constant attention by the business press, far less time has been devoted to those who have the potential to take advantage of this (hopefully) [...]
Get your paper trail ready; expansion of 1099 use coming in 2012 June 29, 2010 Interesting to note with all the attention that has been focused on the healthcare reform law, a minor change with a major impact is dodging the spotlight. As this article from CNN notes, an enormous bureaucratic burden is looming.
The change revolves around expanding the use of 1099s from pertaining to contract labor to now [...]
Deferring the Roth IRA conversion tax — a no-brainer? Not so fast! June 22, 2010 In past MFA blogs on the subject of Roth IRA conversions, we’ve discussed how to determine if a Roth conversion makes sense for you; we’ve highlighted the estate planning benefits of a Roth IRA; and we’ve outlined several conversion strategies worthy of consideration (segregation strategy and arbitrage strategy).
By now, countless individuals have decided that a [...]
Don’t Ignore the HIRE Act: Tangible Tax Benefits Await Employers June 15, 2010 Through many of my conversations with CFOs, controllers and owners of mid-market and smaller companies, I’ve noticed a running theme that more emphasis should be placed on the tremendous opportunities afforded by the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment (HIRE) Act (see this March 2010 MFA Perspectives for more detail on the HIRE Act). While most [...]
Financial reform: panacea or paper tiger? June 8, 2010 On May 20, 2010, the Senate approved an extensive financial regulatory bill, while a similar bill had passed the House back in December. The bills must now be reconciled and approved by the full Congress, a process which is expected to take several weeks. Overall, the bills are broadly similar, with some important differences [...]
Estate planning perks: everyone in the “speakeasy” before it closes June 1, 2010 When tax revenues plummeted during the Great Depression, Congress needed a new source of revenue to avoid huge deficits. Partially because it would give them something new to tax, Prohibition was ended and a new excise tax on alcohol helped shore up the sagging budgets on the state and federal levels.
Today, as we climb out [...]
More SOX relief in the works? May 18, 2010 The SOX debate continues…. As noted in this recent Compliance Week post, the Senate is gearing up to take on financial reform, and the SOX 404 regulation discussion is emerging again; this time though it’s being debated by Congress and not by the SEC. Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA), the Chairman of the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee [...]
CFOs seeing steps to recovery…are you? May 4, 2010 One of the best things about my role as a certified public accountant in a vibrant economy such as Massachusetts is how I get to meet and work with companies of all sizes, across a broad range of industries. Like most people reading this blog, I’m an avid consumer of information and love to share [...]
IRS provides guidelines for small business health care tax credit April 27, 2010 An Accounting Today post pointed us to a link worth sharing: the IRS’ new informational pages on the small business health care tax credit. The pages walk through the process of applying for the credit, has a frequently asked questions link, and spells out the eligibility rules such as:
- Providing health care coverage. [...]
Much has been made of the anemic mergers and acquisitions market over the past two years as economic turmoil and
tightening of available credit slowed transactions to a snail’s
pace. Profitable deals were few and far between, and with IPOs
also trending downward, the lack of exit opportunities
provided little motivation for investments in mid-sized firms. [...]
As the U.S. emerges from the recession that has plagued the economy during the past 18 months, private equity firms that have been entrenched in their investments are beginning to evaluate exit options in the hopes of earning what is now a long overdue return on their investments. However, there is still a lot of uncertainty on the horizon and as a result, transactions are [...]
In the wake of security breaches at such high profile companies as TJX and Hannaford Supermarkets, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts enacted a law (201 CMR 17.00) designed to protect state citizens’ personal information. This law, which has already been revised and postponed three times, [...]
"Variable Interest Entity" is a term that often signals difficult work to come for accountants. Historically, FASB Interpretation No. (FIN) 46R, Consolidation of Variable Interest Entities, dictated a myriad of quantitative and formula driven criteria under which to evaluate the existence of a variable interest [...]
A trend that continues to grow in popularity is the outsourcing of key business processes to service organizations that have aggregated specialized resources and are able to maximize service delivery through a cost structure and economies of scale that often cannot be achieved via in-house resources. [...]
Did you know that employee benefit plans are now required to implement accounting rules for valuing and reporting the fair value of their investments in the plan’s financial statements? [...]
A confluence of downward trending economic and business events, including the continued decline in stock values during the latter part of 2008 and early 2009, is leading companies to reshape their business plans. [...]
Recent changes to Mergers and Acquisitions accounting has given rise to new questions, confusion, and sometimes even hesitation over completing a deal. Requirements under FAS141R are behind it all, and companies [...]
As if technology and the U.S. economic struggles haven’t made for enough of a roller coaster for international business in the past few years, globalization is really just getting started. [...]
A SAS 70 Report is designed to provide information and assurance about controls within a service organization to user organizations (customers) and their auditors. The services are conducted in accordance with the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) Statement on Auditing [...]
Over the course of two decades, online sales went from fad to fortune to bust, and have now settled in as part of everyday business for a wide variety of small to medium sized companies. In fact, if you’re selling something then you most likely have an online component [...]
In response to the massive financial scandals in Japan (e.g., Seibu Railway, Kanebo, Livedoor and Murakami Fund) Japan’s Parliament enacted the Financial Instruments and Exchange Law in June of 2006. [...]
It may be that for the first half of 2009, tumbleweeds outnumbered deals spotted across the M&A landscape. But even in the face of this financial crisis, companies are adapting to the new environment with creative structures that will enable dealflow to keep some form of momentum. [...]
WebCPA, January 23, 2009
Management Over Myth Interview with Carl Famiglietti, Managing Partner
Carl Famiglietti is managing partner of Moody, Famiglietti & Andronico, based in Boston. He says that accounting firm management often finds itself locked in a tug of war between applying theory and being pragmatic, a struggle that can dampen capabilities and in some cases, the overall development of a firm. [...]
In light of a struggling economy, collapsing financial giants, and the well-documented credit crisis, this year’s Economic Stimulus Act is big news.The move by the White House to inject capital back into the system is most famous for its rebates to individuals, but businesses will see the benefits as well. [...]
“One high profile piece of the CPA’s complex landscape is the common struggle to recruit and retain qualified talent,” says Carl Famiglietti, the managing partner of MFA – Moody, Famiglietti & Andronico, based in Tewksbury, Mass. [...]
You've mentioned you see the CPA and consulting world eveloving. Why should leaders take notice?
Sarbanes-Oxley and directives for Boards and corporate policy have chnaged company structure quite [...]
The shift toward mandating fair value assessments will present major challenges for many companies. A partner in a Boston-area accounting firm argues that businesses ned to determine if they have adequate resources for dealing with the issue in-house. [...]
There's nothing new about transacting business online. That's an everyday (every hour, every miniyte) occurrence relaied upon by businesses and consumers alike. In the software world, it's only natural that the web would become a critical point of sale. [...]
Someday, the accouting industry will look back over the early 2000s and pinpoint the moment when the compliance and accoutning requirements began to hold companies back from fulfilling their potential. A chain of events triggered by the implementation of the [...]
At the request of subscribers, Compliance Week offers a Remediation Center, in which readers can submit questions—anonymously—to securities and accounting experts. Compliance Week’s editors will review all questions and then submit them—confidentially, of course—to specialists who can address the issues. [...]
MFA – Moody, Famiglietti & Andronico, LLP is a proactive CPA and consulting firm located North of Boston with National and Global reach. Founded in 1982, the firm is comprised of nearly 100 professionals including 14 partners whose speed, precision, and commitment to client success results in proven best value solutions that offer the ideal combination of expertise, service and price.
