Innovation Decreased by 40% at Technology Companies After They Went Public, Finds Stanford Graduate School of Business Study Leslie Kwoh at the Wall Street Journal reports that while many tech entrepreneurs dream of taking their companies public, they may want to think twice.  While public offerings raise cash, new research suggests that IPOs can also result in stunted innovation at technology firms.   Here ...

Marvell Technology Group Sold Billions of Semiconductors Developed at Carnegie Mellon University  Jad Mouawad reports in the New York Times that Carnegie Mellon University said it was awarded $1.17 billion by a federal jury in Pittsburgh on Wednesday in a unanimous verdict that found the Marvell Technology Group had sold billions of semiconductors using technology developed at the university without a licen ...

The accounting rulemakers said they are seeking more feedback about whether groups of companies could phase in IFRS and how investors are dealing with the two sets of accounting rules currently existing in the United States. Emily Chasen at WSJ CFO Report writes [trial subscription required] that accounting rulemakers in the U.S. and abroad are calling for collaboration even as U.S. regulators have so far r ...

2013 California Filings:   Aetna: 22 percent.  Anthem Blue Cross: 26 percent.  Blue Shield of California: 20 percent. Reed Abelson at the New York Times reported last week that health insurance companies across the country are seeking and winning double-digit increases in premiums for some customers, even though one of the biggest objectives of the Obama administration’s health care law was to stem the rapi ...

An Interview with Jeremy Levine, a Partner at Bessemer Venture Partners As the new year begins, the Wall Street Journal's Venture Capital Dispatch — which focuses largely on high-tech start-ups and their investors — has asked several venture capital investors to reflect on the past year and give us their outlook for 2013.  Recently, it spoke with Jeremy Levine, a partner at Bessemer Venture Partners. Levine ...

There's good news and bad news.  Here's the low-down.   Dean Zerbe offers his take at Forbes on how the current deal will affect small-business owners: ...

Ambitious plans to overhaul the individual tax code, tackle corporate rates, revamp the Medicare program and consider changes in Social Security appear to have given way mainly to a tax increases for big earners Jennifer Steinhauer of the New York Times reports that "doing business in pieces" seems to be :the nature of what constitutes progress in such a sharply divided political world."  More: ...

Barnes & Noble’s Missing $500 Million; A Discrepancy Between Physical and Digital Property Values Tom Gara reports at The Wall Street Journal Corporate Intelligence blog that "UK-based publisher Pearson bought into Barnes & Noble's Nook Media digital business today [12/28/12], buying a 5% stake in the e-book company for $89.5 million and valuing the whole business at just under $1.8 billion. ...

Small Business Owners Hiring Intentions for the Next 12 Months Dropped to -4 in November, Down from +10 in July Jeffrey Sparshott at the Wall Street Journal Real-Time Economy Blog reports the news:   ...

Although 2013 Rates Are Still Unclear, Smart Planners Are Making These Moves Today Laura Sanders at the Wall Street Journal reports that the annual scramble to make smart tax moves before December 31 is proving especially vexing this year, since Congress still hasn’t settled 2013 tax rates on income, investments, large gifts, and estates. Deductions and other breaks are in doubt.  And some questions—such as ...

Media Vary on Whether Election Increases or Decreases  Uncertainty;  Concur It's Good for Business A number of media outlets have begun to weigh in on the topic. At Accounting Today, the editors have put together a topical list of some of the relevant issues: ...

Star Wars Creator Strikes Savvy Deal with Disney Quentin Fottrell at CBS MarketWatch reports that Disney will buy George Lucas' LucasFilm for $4.05 billion in cash and stock, the two companies announced Tuesday: Wade Westhoff, a financial adviser based in Danville, Calif., says of the Disney deal. “This is a textbook example of exit planning for a private business owner.” (Lucas and a spokesman for LucasFil ...

"It Got a Bit Ugly" Sarah E. Needleman at the WSJ Small Business Blog reports:  Ten months after co-founding a communications firm in 2008, Tami Hausman asked her business partner to meet at a local Starbucks. Things weren't working out, Ms. Hausman says, and she wanted to run the New York company on her own. ...

Insurers Say Rates Can Surge After Hospitals Buy Private Physician Practices; Medicare Spending Rises, Too    Anne Wilde Matthews at the Wall Street Journal reports that the increased number of physicians going to work for hospitals is actually resulting in higher costs for patients.   Hospitals are acquiring physician practices and integrating them into hospital services, and while the stated goal is to im ...

New Rule Intended to Help Inform Mortgage Applicants of How Value Is Determined  The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) released Wednesday a new proposed rule that would require mortgage lenders to provide home loan applicants with appraisal reports to determine how the value of a property was determined, reports Tory Barringer at DS News, an outlet that focuses on the mortgage default servicing in ...

Six Initial Public Offerings Seek to Raise $1.1 Billion  The IPO market is set for its biggest week since Facebook Inc.'s FB +4.98% troubled offering in May, with Manchester United Ltd. and the operator of Outback Steakhouse among those scheduled to hit the tape, reports the Wall Street Journal.   More: ...

Bond King Says Stocks are Dead:  Believes Consistent, Annual Returns Are "Thing of the Past."  On the Horizon?  Inflation. “The cult of equity is dying,” Bill Gross wrote in his August Investment Outlook, the Wall Street Journal's Market Beat blog reports.    “Like a once bright green aspen turning to subtle shades of yellow then red in the Colorado fall, investors’ impressions of ‘stocks for the long run’ ...

10 Years After Implementation, NYT Cites Lawyer, Former SEC Official, PCAOB Oversight Member, and Editor Who See SOX as a Positive Development.  WSJ Sources Not So Sure.  IBD Claims SOX Has "Devastated" IPO Market.  The Times’ “Room for Debate” roundtable noted that last Sunday, July 24th, marked 10 years since the Sarbanes-Oxley accounting law was enacted, after the scandals at Enron, WorldCom and elsewher ...

Shielding the Family Business The best part for valuators is that all of this requires a professional appraisal (detail below). The Wall Street Journal Tax Report's Laura Sanders reports  that: Small-business owners often complain of feeling caught in the cross hairs of the tax code. For a change, here's good news. The Tax Court has just blessed a new technique that owners of closely held businesses—and wea ...

Two New Taxes on Net Investment Income and Medicare Will Take Effect on January First At the Wall Street Journal's Tax Report, Laura Saunders explains.   The word is out: Two new taxes on the affluent and wealthy will take effect as scheduled next year as a result of the Supreme Court's decision upholding the health-care overhaul. One is a new 3.8% tax on net investment income, and the other is a 0.9% incre ...