Professor Elam

SA CPA Student Luncheon

Friday April 20, 2012

The annual student awards luncheon by SA CPA was held today at Oak Hills CC. 

That's David, Remi, Laura, and Renee Foshee Tax  Instructor from left to right. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shirley Peterson from Ridout Barret and Fred Timmons, TSCPA statewide President Elect. Fred volunteered to come to campus to discuss Texas CPA issues with our students. 

I made other new friends for our campus including our table sponsor, Steven Bankler. Steven is a CPA and a Certified in financial Forensics.  He indicated he would be interested in helping us fashion our courses in forensic accounting. 

Eric Mack Executive Director of Financial Reporting for USAA Real Estate also expressed an interest in coming to campus. I am sure he would be a valuable resource on the latest in SEC compliance.

So a good day for TAMUSA at SA CPA!

Here is Renee Foshee with SA CPa Exec Director Jacqui Belcher.

Here is 

 

Law School Meltdown

Friday April 20, 2012

The next financial crisis will have its roots in student loan defaults. Law school ain't what it was 

cracked up to be.   I suspect many of these people could find jobs but they would need to become assistant city attorneys i nowheresville USA. The problem is chasing a dream versus a realistic job. 

Another Ethics Scandal

Thursday Apirl 19, 2012

Do you know Rita Crundwell?  I didn't either until today but she is going go make the Rogues Gallery of Who Do you Trust in small town America. I find these things fascinating because I once had a serious fiduciary position with a small county. 

Students are aware that I regularly preach that Internal Auditing is the fastest growing field in accounting. This is a case in point. Rita as the comptroller for a town with a budget of a mere $4.2 M. Yet she has apparently embezzled millions, a great deal since just 2006.

This case fits all the classic internal audit questionnaire stats. She was discovered when she took a leave and someone else checked the books. Rule-enforce mandatory vacations. 

She lived an extravagant lifestyle far beyond her means. The town really believed she made money in the horse business?  Nobody makes money in the horse business, except perhaps the stable and feed store. Rule-observe lifestyles. 

Everyone trusted her.  Rule-it's always an inside job. As I explained to one student in my office this semester, they are called con men (and women) because they get your confidence. 

If any of my grad students are still looking for an audit failure or financial blow up, here is the latest. 

 

The Latest on instagram

Thursday April 19, 2012

Here is the latest on the estimate of FB and instagram valuations.

Grantham on Herding

Thursday April 19, 2012 6:40 AM

Last night in Intermed I I observed that a common complaint about American markets is the focus on short term results. I mentioned that San Antonio's own Sam Barshop the founder of La Qinta, complains of the same thing. As he observes one quarter is not a good measure of a national hotel chain.

 

Fund managers runtogether. They are usually all doing the same thing. A week ago talking heads unanimously recommended Apple. This week Apple is finally correcting. Last week they all bought Apple, this week they all sold Apple. 

Jeremy Grantham remarks on how this short term focused crowd behavior amplifies short term movements in prices, of everything. 

Text Analytics

Thursday April 19, 2012

Another concept demonstrated at the Socionomic Summit was the application of Text Analytics. One can examine the number of tweets at Twitter for trends in social mood. For exmple, this graph at right illustrates the number of articles discussing a Hard Landing in China. Key words can be examined in both Twitter and  Google Searches.  The more often they appear the greater the interest in that topic. From that perspective both are methods of market feedback. 

822,751 Reasons to Oppose the Buffet Rule

Thursday April 19, 2012

I metioned the GSA Scandal in class last evening. The President believes those making money shold pay more taxes. For a look at what sending dollars to Washington buys one, click here.

Be sure to leaf thru the Neely photo album. This makes the case that there is just no accountability in the Federal Government. 

Individuals who make over a million dollars a years if allowed to keep their money, can and do support many worthwhile projects. Art museums, community theaters, and yes universities are supported by such contributions.

And then there are innovative projects like Morgans Wonderland.

As I remared, when it comes time to teach Ethcis in the spring, I always have new examples for the class!

Job Posting at City of San Antonio

Wed April 18, 2012 11;43 AM CST

The City of San Antonio will soon have a job announcement  looking to fill an Auditor I position.  COSA’s job postings can be seen at the web address below:

 http://www.sanantonio.gov/hr/jobs/index.asp

This would be an Internal Auditor position. I think this is right up the alley so to speak for our students. Take note.

 

 

Market HIghs Bring New Round of Mergers and Acquisition

Wed April 18, 2012 11:03 AM CST

Social mood becomes inclusionary at market highs. Positive mood results in a desire to 'come together.'  Jim Rogers observes that most of these deals never work ou, the competing cultures, the lay offs, what ever, and indeed the goodwill paid  is often written off  a few years later.

But consider the recent rash just from today's WSJ

Facebook offers $1 Billion in cash and stock for Instagram. The rationale is that gee FB ought to be worth $200 B and gosh Mr. Systrom at Instagram offers that it should be worth one percent of that, okay make it $1 billion.

Argentina grabbed IPF its largest oil and gas producer. But IPF is owned by Spain's Repsol, welcome to socialism in Argentina!

Audi is going to pay $1.1 B for Italian motorcycle manufacturer Ducati. Apparently this will allow Audi to parallel BMW's motorcycle business. I don't see the culture mix there but ...

Amazon acquired the rights to the 14 classic by Fleming Bond Novels, this one does make sense.

Nestle is buying Pfizer's infant nutrition business for $9 Billion. Their offer beat out Damon and Mead.

Good ideas or bad, it happens during periods of good not bad mood. No one was merging in March, 2009.

CHK CEO Borrows $1.1 B

Wednesday April 18, 2012

The CEO of CHK has borrowed $1.1 B from his own company. The money is used so that he can invest a 2.5% interest in the company's own wells. He and the company claim there is no conflict of interest. Ge looks like a sort of related party loan to me!  What do you think?

Business Insider also questions the judgement of the CEO.