Particularly When Valuing Companies with Substantial Foreign Operations, Business Valuation Analysts Know That Country-Specific Input Is Critical  David Foster at BVWire News reports that in additional to his general data update for 2013, Prof. Aswath Damodaran (NYU Stern School of Business) provides a list of country default spreads and risk premiums.  Here's the professor's assessment: ...

Watch Out, Wall Street!  The Federal Reserve, a Primary Banking Regulator, is Trying Harder to Spot Speculative Excesses Peter Eavis at The New York Times Dealbook reports: In a speech on Thursday, governor Jeremy C. Stein, who joined the Fed last year, focused on parts of the financial markets that show signs of overheating. He went into considerable detail, citing metrics that appear designed to spot bubb ...

"It's a Huge Case for the Patent-Law Community." On One Side: Google, Facebook, Intuit.  On the Other? IBM. "Because the patents are often unclear, there's no way to know whether an infringement claim by a competitor or a troll is legitimate until you've spent $8 million in litigation fees," said Mr. Schruers Ashby Jones in the Wall Street Journal  reports this morning that a federal appeals court in Washin ...

The FBI Says it Busted an 18-Person Ring that Spanned 8 Countries and 28 States.  Make Up. Pump Up. Run Up. Daniel Gross at The Daily Beast explains:  It’s not the latest exercise fad. Rather, according to the Justice Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, it’s the three-step process through which an 18-person ring allegedly committed a stunning $200 million credit-card fraud.   Here're the bas ...

Six Days of Package Delivery and Five Days of Mail.  Does This Mean Stamp Prices Will Go Down by 16¢?   Michael Cohn at Accounting Today reports that the U.S. Postal Service said Wednesday that it will end Saturday delivery of letters starting in August, but will continue to deliver packages, in an effort to cut costs.  More: The Postal Service expects to generate cost savings of approximately $2 billion an ...

Few Business Owners Seem to Even Know How to Make a Good Guess at What Their Business is Worth.  NY Times Introduces Technology to Help—and Certified Advisers Provide Extra Value.  Mark Cohen, at The New York Times Small Business Guide, reports:  "At 53, Joe Ritz is old enough to remember a time when many of the classic cars that now pull into his specialized repair shop were new. “It’s one field where it p ...

Aswath Damodaran, NYU's Legendary Valuation Expert, Recently Argues that there's a 90% Chance Apple is Undervalued.  Here's Why.   This comes in the wake of Apple shares' breathtaking plunge from recent highs. (That's be about $700 in September to $425 or so today.) In a new blog post, Sam Ro at Business Insider reports that Damodaran thinks that management can learn a few things from the recent market vola ...

Fed Buying Is Having Profound Implications. Bond Vigilantes Have Been Selling Heavily and May Continue. That Means We Still We Won't See Much of an Impact on Interest Rates. Paul Santos at Seeking Alpha claims you don't need to worry about the bond vigilantes anymore.  I, personally, have always been a big fan, and think they will return.  But hey: This is Mr. Santos' opinion piece, not mine, so I'll let hi ...

Stakeholders Discuss Greater Institutional Investor Makeup, Governance Structures, Greater Regulatory Scrutiny Deloitte Insights contributes a piece to the CFO Journal on the Wall Street Journal site, part of a series designed to provide financial executives a customized resource to help them address the strategic, operational and regulatory issues they face in managing their finance organizations and caree ...

Firms Need to Update Technology, Use Social Media, and Hire Younger Advisors, Says Tom Nally of TD Ameritrade Institutional Rachel F. Elson at reports at Financial Planning:  Advisory firms need to start hiring young financial advisers to attract and keep the business of Generation X and Y investors, who will have accumulated $28 trillion of personal wealth by 2018, up from $2 trillion in 2011, said Tom Nal ...

Cash Flow is the Most Important Financial Item for a Small Business Owners to Pay Attention To. Here's How to Speed it Up.   Cash flow--how cash flows through your organization from sale to invoice to receipt--is the lifeblood of a small company, writes Eric V. Holtzclaw at Inc.com.  And speeding up your cash flow allows you to do more and gives your company more stability.  Here are seven tips:   ...

Accounting Isn't Just a Necessary Evil; Sometimes the Methods Can be Used as a Key Part of Your Business Strategy   Jeff Haden at Inc. answers a question from a reader who wonders if it matters what inventory accounting method she uses.   It does!  Here's some explanation, and specific advice:  ...

Tighter Regulations Leave Less Room for Error When Computing and Disclosing How Much Mortgages Cost.  John Adams at American Banker reports that Ernst Publishing, not related to the accounting company, sells technology and closing cost data to mortgage market players. Its clients include nine of the largest ten originators and servicers and the largest five title insurance companies.  And it has now receive ...

Many Business Buyers Probably Have Some Boilerplate Questions Ready to Ask Business Sellers — But May be Missing the Most Important Ones.   Mike Handelsman, group general manager for BizBuySell.com and BizQuest.com, the Internet's largest and most heavily trafficked business-for-sale marketplaces, recently advised readers at Inc.com that if they're thinking about buying a business, they should put extra eff ...

Details Found in IRS Explanation Issued Wednesday; $20,000 Figure Based on a Family of Four.   In a final regulation issued Wednesday, January 30, 2013, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) assumed that under Obamacare the cheapest health insurance plan available in 2016 for a family will cost $20,000 for the year.   Under Obamacare, Americans will be required to buy health insurance or pay a penalty to the I ...

Rule Will Require a Second Appraisal in Situations Where a Home is Being Flipped for a Quick, Higher Resale  A new rule passed Jan. 15 gives mortgage lenders an additional year to institute appraisal standards for higher-risk loans, Bloomberg reported, and Appraiser News Online highlighted.  The extension is one of the revisions that regulators made to the Dodd-Frank Act to address concerns from financial f ...