Читать книгу Financial Accounting For Dummies - Maire Loughran - Страница 86

SOX created the watchdog of the public company accounting and auditing profession: the PCAOB. The PCAOB is private, nonprofit corporation charged with bringing a halt to the financial shenanigans on the part of corporate chief financial officers (CFOs) and chief executive officers (CEOs) for publicly traded companies. Public accountants — those doing work for companies other than their own employer — support this goal through the preparation of informative, fair, and independent financial statement (audit) reports.

The PCAOB consists of five members, including a chairman appointed by the SEC and two members who must be — or previously have been — certified public accountants (CPAs). The chairman must be one of the two CPA members, but she cannot be an active CPA; in fact, she cannot have been a practicing CPA for at least five years prior to being appointed to the position. Being a member is a full-time, five-year commitment.

The PCAOB sanctions CPA firms for not following its standards. Its authority includes the death knell of revoking the CPA firm’s license and barring its partners from working in public accounting. This is pretty serious stuff because it effectively closes the CPA firm’s doors and keeps the individual CPAs from plying their trade.