News

Mark Koziel, CPA, CGMA, has been named as the incoming CEO of AICPA & CIMA, which operate together as the Association of International Certified Professional Accountants. The appointment comes after a comprehensive global search for a successor to Barry Melancon, CPA, CGMA, the longest-serving CEO in AICPA history, who announced in May that he would retire at the end of the year.

The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) and the National Association of State Boards of Accountancy (NASBA) have proposed amendments to the Uniform Accountancy Act to include the CPA Competency-Based Experience Pathway. The changes are designed to define a new licensure pathway while ensuring mobility for certified public accountants (CPAs) licensed under the Uniform Accountancy Act (UAA) framework.

Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders has signed an executive order to extending tax relief granted due to severe storms in Baxter, Benton, Boone, Carroll, Fulton, Grant, Greene, Madison, Marion, Nevada, Randolph, Sevier, and Sharp counties.

AR Department of Finance and Administration announces new Withholding instructions, tables and formula following the passage of an income tax cut retroactive to Jan. 1, 2024.

On April 23, 2024, the U.S. Department of Labor (Department) announced a final rule, Defining and Delimiting the Exemptions for Executive, Administrative, Professional, Outside Sales, and Computer Employees, which will take effect on July 1, 2024.

A federal district court in Alabama held that the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA), P.L. 116-283, which requires the reporting of beneficial ownership information (BOI) by businesses, is unconstitutional. The district court granted the plaintiffs' motion for summary judgment Friday in the case of National Small Business United v. Yellen, No. 5:22-cv-1448-LCB (N.D. Ala. 3/1/24). One plaintiff, the National Small Business Association, has over 65,000 members. While the legislation may have "sensible and praiseworthy ends," the court stated in its opinion, the government's arguments that Congress has "the power to regulate millions of entities and their stakeholders the moment they obtain a formal corporate status" from a state "are not supported by precedent." The act "exceeds the Constitution's limits on the legislative branch and lacks a sufficient nexus to any numerated power to be a necessary or proper means of achieving Congress' policy goals," the opinion said.

January 1, 2024 -Today, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) began accepting beneficial ownership information reports. The bipartisan Corporate Transparency Act, enacted in 2021 to curb illicit finance, requires many companies doing business in the United States to report information about the individuals who ultimately own or control them.

Enacted as part of the 2021 National Defense Authorization Act and amending the Bank Secrecy Act, the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA) is intended to close a perceived information gap related to money laundering and other illicit acts. The CTA requires reporting companies to self-report information to the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (Fin-CEN) about their beneficial owners and company applicants. Determining whether a company is considered a “reporting company” and whether an individual is considered a “beneficial owner” or a “company applicant” under the CTA is complex, and failure to comply with the CTA can result in civil or criminal penalties (or both). For instance, the failure to comply with the statutorily-mandated reporting timeframes regarding the filing of initial or updated reports could result in a $500-per-day penalty (up to $10,000) and up to two years of imprisonment. Additionally, any person who, without authorization, knowingly discloses or uses beneficial ownership information (BOI) can be fined $500 per day (up to $250,000) and imprisoned for up to five years.

The IRS increased the optional standard mileage rate used to calculate the deductible costs of operating a vehicle for business to 67 cents per mile driven, up 1.5 cents from 2023. The increased rate is effective as of Jan. 1, 2024 (Notice 2024-08).