The Case of Trademarks and Brands Since the adoption of fair value accounting governed by SFAS 141 (in 2001) and IFRS 3 (in 2004), hundreds of thousands of different intangible assets have been valued, audited, and reported in financial statements of public companies all over the world. After fifteen years of fair value accounting, the debate about the accuracy of such values and their relevance for readers is no less controversial than at its beginning. This is a pity because, in its essence, fair value data is an excellent resource for corporate finance professionals to understand more about the value…
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Nuances Valuing and Normalizing an Auto Dealership There are many reasons an auto dealership may require a business valuation; buy-sell agreements, shareholder disputes, employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs), and estate planning and gifting strategies. In many instances, there will be an opposing party that questions the validity of the final value, whether it be a dissenting stockholder or the Internal Revenue Service. It is imperative the dealer be aware of the basic characteristics of a valuation so the dealer is able to make sure the valuation analyst is using sound judgments and that, if challenged, the value will be defensible.
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FLPs Remain a Viable Intra-Family Transfer Option, But Act Now The Internal Revenue Service has floated the idea of making regulatory changes to the implementation of section 2704, in this article the author gives us an update on the subject and underscores the need to facilitate intra-family transfers of businesses.
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Tell-tale Signs that the Engagement is Risky This article describes, using a purely hypothetical scenario, some of the considerations that an economic damages expert should be aware of during initial telephone calls with a prospective retaining counsel—in order for a lost earnings engagement to proceed effectively and efficiently—and to control engagement risk.
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Settlement of a Valuation Case Before the U.S. Tax Court This article discusses issues found in a case that is pending before the United States Tax Court (the “Tax Court”). The specific issues relate to issues regarding sales of closely held stock to grantor trusts in exchange for promissory notes. Specifically, the IRS took issue with two grantor sale trust transactions. The two cases were filed on December 26, 2013, as (1) Estate of Donald Woelbing v. Commissioner, Docket No. 30261-13, and (2) Estate of Marion Woelbing v. Commissioner, Docket No. 30260-13.
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Effective Interview Planning in a Fraud Investigation This article is a republication of Chapter 10 of The Corporate Fraud: The Executive’s Survival Guide, authored by Ray Dunkle of Red Flag Reporting. This article features the chapter written by James I. Marasco, CPA, CIA, CFE. In this chapter, Mr. Marasco addresses the proper approach for conducting interviews. This includes what type of questions to ask, what verbal cues and mannerisms may suggest, and the “do and do not’s” of proper interviewing. It is important to be aware of specific requirements governing the jurisdiction in which the interview takes place. States have…
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About Valuing Pass-Through Entities
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Is Recognizing Cognitive and Motivational Biases Enough? The National Academy of Sciences reported that bias is a severe problem in forensic sciences. Cognitive biases were described as, “common features of decision making, and they cannot be willed away.” Is recognizing bias, alone, sufficient to address cognitive, motivational or other biases? What can a forensic expert do to avoid the bias trap? In this article, the author answers these questions.
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Businesses Where Real Estate is Integral to Operations What is the best approach to use to value a business where real estate is indispensable to operations? In this article, Dr. Brous discusses the use of the option to abandon.
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Correlating Patent Values with Prior Citations What is forward patent citation? Why is it relevant? In this article, the author answers the above questions and details how these may be relevant to a damages expert in a patent infringement matter. These experts may need to ascertain the value attributable to the patented technology at issue. While comparable license agreements may serve useful in providing a market-based approach to arriving at a value, the damages expert must also seek to apportion out the comparable patents related to the patented technology within the comparable license agreements from that of the intellectual property…
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Qualified Business Appraiser and Appraisal Needed A November 2015 memorandum by the U.S. Tax Court in Fleming Cardiovascular, P.A. v. Commissioner found that the Internal Revenue Services (“IRS”) did not abuse its discretion in revoking the Fleming Cardiovascular, P.A. Employee Stock Ownership Plan’s (“ESOP”) qualified and tax exempt status for failure to operate in accordance with plan documents. Of note, the ESOP failed to obtain an independent annual valuation of the stock by a qualified appraiser in five out of seven plan years.
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The Best Source of Referrals is One Not Readily Considered How can one maximize referral opportunities? What separates the most successful professional services firms from the rest? One key difference is surprisingly simple, and often overlooked: successful firms understand the process of referrals. Most firms work under long-held referral assumptions that are not effective. Most believe that winning new business through referrals essentially boils down to a simple formula: do good work for your clients and rub elbows with a few referral sources, such as attorneys and CPAs, and business will come from those sources. This article debunks that presumption.
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IP Valuation—Beyond the Income and Cost Approach Valuation analysts (“analysts”) are often asked to value debtor company intellectual property (IP) within a business bankruptcy context. Some of the bankruptcy reasons to value IP include the assessment of the following: the debtor’s solvency, a secured creditor’s collateral and protection, the fairness of a Section 363 IP asset sale or license, the debtor’s rejection of its IP licenses (and the implications of that rejection on the IP licensees) under Bankruptcy Code Section 365(n), and the reasonableness of a plan of reorganization. Many analysts immediately think of applying income approach or cost approach…
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In Appraising Outpatient Enterprises Healthcare related outpatient enterprises are those that provide services that do not require hospital admission and may be performed outside the premises of a hospital. Valuation of healthcare related outpatient enterprises, similar to the valuation of any business, should include consideration of the three general approaches to valuation, i.e., the income approach, the market approach, and the asset/cost approach. Use of specific methods under each approach will be guided by the facts and circumstances of the engagement, e.g., availability of data, nature of the current transactional marketplace, etc. This article focuses on utilizing an asset/cost based…
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The Emergence of the Transitional Support Advisor Following a divorce, how does a financially naïve former spouse transition to become a financially independent former spouse? In this article, the author discusses what is a Transitional Support Expert and that professional’s role in a dissolution proceeding and following entry of the decree.
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Prepare, Verify, and Excel at Trial In order to recover lost profits in a commercial damage case, three standards must be met. First, plaintiff must show proximate cause; second, the foreseeability; and third, reasonable certainty. This article will focus on the third standard, reasonable certainty. Experts seeking to provide realistic lost profit estimates must be aware of this standard. The following discussion will review literature, court decisions, and practical efforts that may assist experts in addressing reasonable certainty.
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Why the Choice Between Prime and Treasury Rate Matters Many bankruptcy practitioners have focused on the recent decisions in Momentive[1] that forced secured creditors to refinance prepetition loans at below market interest rates. Most of these practitioners’ publications focus on the courts’ findings and the potential implication on future matters. However, three interesting questions are not addressed in most (if any) of these publications.
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Secured Creditors Lost Almost $200 Million in Economic Value Due to the Imposition of Below Market Interest Rates Many bankruptcy practitioners have focused on the recent decisions in Momentive[1] that forced secured creditors to refinance prepetition loans at below market interest rates. Most of these practitioners’ publications focus on the courts’ findings and the potential implication on future matters.
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The Present Value of Future Lost Profits, and the Time Value of Money Experts estimating the present value of a business’ future lost profits have much less direction from the courts than their counterparts estimating the present value of a person’s lost earning capacity. Professional literature has attempted to fill this gap providing many articles discussing the differing methods for analyzing lost profits (e.g., yardstick, before-and-after, but for) or how to determine the discount rate by applying a weighted cost of average capital, equity rates of return, or some form of risk premium build-up. This article moves away from these…
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SPARC the Analysis and Shine Have you ever asked your clients what drives the value of their businesses? If they feel comfortable that they know what drives their business’ value, have you ever asked them why it does? In this article, first of a two part series, Sarah von Helfenstein shares her thoughts on the kinds of things that we, as business analysts and appraisers, should consider when assessing business value.