Center for Financial Integrity Hosts Third Annual Financial Reporting Conference on April 29

FASB, SEC and Other Officials Brief Auditors, Accountants, Attorneys on New Regulatory Environment; PCAOB’s Carmichael Visits Home

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Register online at the conference website


BARUCH COLLEGE, NEW YORK, NY – Baruch College’s Center for Financial Integrity (CFI) along with Baruch’s Stan Ross Department of Accountancy, will host the third annual Financial Reporting Conference on April 29, continuing the CFI’s mandate of providing fora for learning and discussion that will lead to an increased understanding of the changing regulatory and ethical issues shaping financial reporting and corporate governance and, ultimately, to greater corporate transparency and investor confidence.

The daylong event will be held in the Newman Vertical Campus Conference Center, on the 14th floor of Baruch’s award winning Newman Vertical Campus at 24th Street and Lexington Avenue. Registration and continental breakfast begin at 7:30 AM.

Launched in the wake of the Enron scandal and other similar accounting lapses three years ago, the conference has become a major opportunity for accounting executives to be apprised of the latest developments in corporate financial reporting standards and issues of corporate governance. One pleasantly dramatic moment can be expected during the luncheon address by Douglas Carmichael, chief auditor of the Public Companies Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB), as the address marks a homecoming – Carmichael rose to prominence at Baruch as the CFI’s founding director and as Morton Wollman Distinguished Professor of Accountancy. He is currently on leave from his faculty position. Weinstein Professor of Accountancy Steven B. Lilien is the new director of CFI.

Other speakers include FASB chairman Robert Herz and SEC chief accountant Don Nicolaisen, who will jointly deliver the conference’s opening address; Carol Stacy, the SEC’s chief accountant in the Division of Corporate Finance, a panelist in a discussion entitled ‘Current Developments at the SEC’; and Mark Bielstein, a partner at KPMG LLP and chairman of the Accounting Standards Executive Committee (AcSEC), a panelist who will address current developments in the private sector.

The day’s formal proceedings begin at 8:00 a.m. with welcoming remarks by Baruch president Ned Regan and Executive Professor-in-Residence Norman Strauss, who is the organizer of the conference. Regan, prior to assuming the Baruch presidency, served for fourteen years as Comptroller of the State of the New York. Strauss is the former national director of accounting for Ernst & Young LLP.

The full agenda for the conference is as follows:

7:30 - 8:15 am - Registration and Breakfast

8:15 - 8:30 am - Welcome and Introduction
NED REGAN - President, Baruch College
NORMAN N. STRAUSS - Former National Director of Accounting, Ernst & Young LLP, Executive-Professor-in-Residence,Baruch College

8:30 - 9:15 am - Opening Remarks
ROBERT HERZ - Chairman, Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB)
DON NICOLAISEN - Chief Accountant, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)

9:15– 10:35 am - Panel: Current Developments at the SEC
SCOTT TAUB - Deputy Chief Accountant, SEC
CAROL STACEY - Chief Accountant, Division of Corporate Finance
THOMAS C. NEWKIRK - Esq. Associate Director, Enforcement, SEC

10:50 am – 12:15 pm - Panel: Current Developments in the Private Sector
EDWARD W. TROTT - Board Member, FASB
MARK BIELSTEIN - Partner, KPMG LLP, Chairman, AcSEC
JAMES JOHNSON - Partner, Deloitte & Touche LL, Member, Emerging Issues Task Force
CONNIE MCDANIEL - Controller, Coca-Cola, Ltd.

12:15– 2 pm - Luncheon Address
DOUGLAS CARMICHAEL - Chief Auditor, Public Company Accounting Oversight Board

2:00 – 3:40 pm - Panel: Business Combinations - Phase II and Consolidations
ROBERT HERZ - Chairman, FASB
JAN HAUSER - Partner, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP
JAMES W. BARGE - Vice President and Controller, AOL Time Warner

4:00– 5:15 pm - Panel: Equity-Based Compensation
CARLO PIPILLO - Partner, Ernst & Young LLP
COLLEEN SAYTHER - President, FEI
EDWARD W. TROTT - Board Member, FASB

Full information including a link to the conference website and biographies and CFI mission can be found at http://www.baruch.cuny.edu/cfi