What do You Have to Lose? Since only a fraction of the cases filed go to trial, it seems prudent to explore settlement sooner rather than later. It is not rocket science, and statistics support the claim that the earlier a case settles the lower the expense to achieve that settlement. If this is not enough to encourage someone to consider mediation sooner rather than later, then perhaps recent court statist ...

After Actions Reviews A firm’s intellectual capital is the most important source of its long-term wealth creating capacity. It must be constantly replenished and created to build the firm’s invisible balance sheet. Constantly focusing on doing rather than learning, creativity, innovation, and knowledge sharing is the equivalent of eating the firm’s seed corn. In this article, Ron Baker discusses the value o ...

Marketing in the New Year In this article, Dr. Frederiksen discusses the importance of thought leadership marketing and how that differs from content marketing. ...

The New Revenue Recognition Standard and Accounting for Licenses Wiley author, Joanne Flood, looks at how the new revenue standard affects reporting of licensing revenue. Copyright Wiley, 2016. To be published in February 2017 in the book: Wiley Revenue Recognition plus Website: Understanding and Implementing the New Standard (Wiley Regulatory Reporting). ...

A Case Study (Part II of II) This is the second of a two-part article. In the first part, Dr. Needham provided factual background regarding this commercial damages case where he served as plaintiff’s damages expert—the case ultimately went to trial. In this second part, Dr. Needham describes the financial data, discovery challenges, the Daubert motion to disqualify him, how the case was decided, and then se ...

A Case Study (Part I of II) Most commercial damages assignments call for the calculation of lost profits or lost business value. However, some cases, particularly those relating to lost profits, contain elements of additional economic damages. These situations require the expert to focus on multiple areas of loss while insuring each element does not contain losses claimed by another. In this two-part articl ...

NACVA Present at the Congressional Hearings on the Proposed Regulations In 2015, the IRS issued proposed section 2704 regulations. The proposal would severely impact valuations of family held businesses that are the subject of gifts. On December 1, 2016, hearings were held in Congress regarding the impact of the proposed regulations. NACVA members, Peter Agrapides, Robert Grossman, and Mark Hanson testified ...

2017 Marketing Tactics Your Firm Needs to Implement Now In this article, Dr. Frederiksen provides five strategies that firms need to implement to firm up or develop their referral marketing strategy and thrive in 2017. ...

A Closer Look at Unjust Enrichment Financial experts typically calculate damages remedies that focus on a plaintiff's loss that is quantified either through lost profits or lost business value. In contrast, unjust enrichment is a damages remedy that measures the defendant's benefit or gain. While the three remedies all serve to quantify damages, an expert must understand the similarities and differences amo ...

Why it Shouldn’t be A Dirty Word in the Valuation of Physician Practices The topic of goodwill in a physician practice acquisition continues to be hotly debated. There are very different viewpoints from reputable appraisers on how to value physician practices and whether hospitals can pay for goodwill in an acquisition. I often hear healthcare professionals involved in acquisitions say, “Hospitals can’t pay ...

Using the Empirical Method Business appraisers around the country have historically used comparisons to the averages found in restricted stock studies to determine a discount for lack of marketability in their valuations of a privately held, noncontrolling interest in a business. While the average discounts from restricted stock studies are useful and indicate that discounts for lack of marketability do occ ...

What NACVA is Doing to Protect Our Industry On August 4, 2016, the U.S. Treasury in lock-step with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) published Proposed Treasury Regulation 163113-02 (hereafter, the “proposed regulations”) which intend to drastically alter the application of current Internal Revenue Code §2704, particularly as it applies to valuations of family owned businesses and family farms. The propose ...

Make the Website Dynamic, Engaging, Educational, and Targeted In this article, Dr. Frederiksen makes four recommendations to improve a website with the goal of turning the visitor into an engagement. ...

Appraisals from Real Estate, Machinery and Equipment to Business Valuation: Book Review by Michael D. Pakter The purpose of this book review is to introduce the reader to Shannon P. Pratt’s newest book, co-authored with John Lifflander. For those improbable few business valuation professionals who do not know who Dr. Pratt is, he is the Chairman and CEO of Shannon Pratt Business Valuation, Inc. and Publishe ...

The Tax Rules Were Never Friendlier, But Changes May be on the Way The biggest loophole in the tax code may soon be coming to an end—at least according to the messages sent by the Obama administration and its recent budget proposals. The American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 (ATRA) set a whole new tone for most estate plans when it took the dreaded estate tax off the table. However, it is no secret that the ...

Analysis of Unaudited Financial Statements—Who and How? There has been much discussion within the ESOP community about the “settlement” and its reverberations. As readers are likely aware, the settlement in question refers to the 2014 settlement agreement between GreatBanc Trust Company and the United States Department of Labor (DOL). The terms of the settlement include, among other things, an agreement con ...

Ways 16 through 30 (Part II of II) This is the second part of this two-part article where the author presents fifteen other structures owners may want to consider as part of a succession plan. Click here to read part one. ...

Ways 1 through 15 (Part I of II) This is the first of a two-part article, where Edward Mendlowitz shares fifteen of the thirty ways to structure a transfer of a business to a successor. Mendlowitz stresses that a succession plan is important and too often overlooked by business owner(s) involved in day-to-day operations. Capturing the value and having a strategy in place provides ongoing cash flow, a degree ...

Copyright Protection and the “First-Sale” Exception In 1997 Supap Kirtsaeng, a citizen of Thailand, moved to the United States to study mathematics at Cornell University. He paid for his education with the help of a Thai Government scholarship which required him to teach in Thailand for ten years on his return. Kirtsaeng successfully completed his undergraduate courses at Cornell, successfully completed a P ...

Part II of III This is Part II of a three-part series discussing the basic components of a professional liability lawsuit brought against an accounting firm and its partners and the factors a firm’s managing partner should take into consideration before and during this type of litigation for utilizing applicable insurance coverage, maximizing effectiveness of defense and, where possible, bringing the contro ...