Chisoxfn

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Apr 1, 2010 -> 08:18 AM) So the government is still going to lose out on this, right? They'll be taking the loses directly instead of paying out subsidies. I think that's what Mike was getting at. It isn't the losses. It is the opportunity cost and Banks weren't going to get enough of a return to do these products as is. They needed to be subsidized. The federal government can do this. It isn't that you are losing money, it is more that you aren't getting enough of a return for it to be a worthwhile investment for your company (ie, the bank). For example: You have 100M. You could loan that 100M on this student loans and get a rate of return of say 1.5%. Now you can switch that and loan this out to the general public or invest in different things and get a 6% return. I'm not saying this is exactly what is happening, but if you are the bank, you not going to touch this 1.5% return when you have other options out there. Now when the subsidy kicks in, all of a sudden that 1.5% return moves up to 3 or 4% and given that it is fully guaranteed it is a nice risk-free return for the bank (thus they provided student loans).

QUOTE (Dubyaj @ Mar 31, 2010 -> 04:49 PM) I used it last year with my Roku box and plan on using it again this year. I think it is a much better way of enjoying it on my tv then connecting it to a laptop, but there is an additional fee of the box. I won't have to pay the fee. I can directly hook my tv to the internet or just hook it to my laptop.

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Mar 31, 2010 -> 03:59 PM) You're missing the point, and it's not like I don't have a CPA and understand a correleation, not a direct relationship of this. Read what I said again. Almost all FAS's have had some correlation to what happened with these financial debacles and cleaning it up - which is a correlation of what SOX is about. No, one is not DIRECTLY tied to the other, but there are correlating circumstances to what the new rules are subsequent to 2003. And you have to have internal controls to get the FAS's right. But Mike's larger point is that the government doesn't have these reporting standards to adhere to - so they "save" when banks had to keep the loans on the books less the deductability of the subsidies. Meanwhile, the government takes the difference and calls that a "savings" when in reality it's revenue neutral to a real accounting of the funds. So they've been saving the books since 1965 than, well before they needed to "save the books". You guys are so far off, its ridiculous.

QUOTE (JohnCangelosi @ Mar 31, 2010 -> 03:18 PM) I do since I live overseas. I just got a new laptop and HDMI data cord that I will be plugging into my HD TV- no idea how that will turn out but the picture quality on the monitor screen is EXCELLENT if you have a high speed connection. Praying it will look even better on the HDTV! I am hoping this year that MLB.TV doesn't blow up (as usual) on opening day- the last 3 years on opening day so many people hit the system that it inevitably crashes it....fingers crossed But most of the time there aren't any issues with it being blurry or tough to follow? I know when I would watch it, sometimes I'd have one hell of a time being able to actually follow the ball due to the buffering.

Anyone use it? Does it work well when plugged into an HD TV? Ie, am I going to be able to get near HD TV quality?

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Mar 31, 2010 -> 02:05 PM) Which has zero to do with this. There is no way that opening up areas to offshore drilling now, will do anything at ALL to gas prices in the next couple years. Furthermore, even when it does start producing - which is probably 5 years out - it will be a very minimal effect if any at all on prices. This is politcal expediency to be sure, but its all about two things. One, short term, its a way of getting what he wants on alt energy, which he all but said in his speech. Two, it continues his chosen methodology to try to make the GOP look bad - offer an olive branch, let the world see them burn it in his hand, then say "fine, they won't play nice, I won't play nice". The only effect it would have is a social/psychological effect. And I don't even know if that is what you'd call it. Short-term we'd never see the effects of long-term drilling except for any pressure that the oil producing countries feel which pressures them into opening up production, etc. Sometimes it is good to apply a little pressure like that, but the best way is to cut demand, improve efficiency and develop alternatives. Personally, I'm incredibly curious to see how this Nissan car does. It isn't priced too terribly and 100 mile drives with 25 minute recharge periods isn't so bad.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 31, 2010 -> 12:09 PM) Nevermind. Neither one of you guys have any idea what I am trying to say. Mike, just an FYI, but the subsidy from the government for student loans started 45 years ago. That is 20+ years before Mark to Market accounting even existed and ~35 years before SOX.

The problem with your theory Mike is you are blaming accounting rules for why the subsidy was given and that isn't really the case. The subsidy was given because these businesses want to make money and they aren't going to waste there resources on stuff that isn't as profitable as other avenues that they can utilize there resources on. Thus, the gov needed to provide a subsidy so that the Banks were making enough of a return to determine that being a part of this business was worth it financially.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 31, 2010 -> 05:49 AM) Apple has to realize though that they are holding all the cards. The iPhone is about the only thing AT&T has going for it right now. Outside of dropped calls, a s***ty network, and slow internet speeds.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 05:53 PM) This exactly what I am talking about with discounted loan valuations. And it has absolute N00000000000000000000 correlation to SOX.

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 06:39 PM) That's not entirely true, Jason. You can make the leap that mark to market (FAS 157) came about as a result of Enron, because of two reasons. 1 - the market that Enron established was falsely valued and 2 - the off balance sheet crap (which is what is now being debated by FASB and IASB). Mark to market would have come about, but not because of SOX but it's certainly intertwined as to the reasons behind it. And mark to market is not just mortgage loan portfolios. It's only a small portion of the FAS. ETA: I see you sort of addressed this but I still maintain what I said here, which makes a slightly different point then you were making. Look guys, I was on the calls. You two are completely off when it comes to this. Go ask anyone that audited or worked accounting in the big investment companies during the time period and not one person will tell you that 157 has anything to do with SOX.

And the real reason mark-to-market accounting became such a hot-ticket item is that in the past we had never had companies in a position where they were going to get absolutely f***ing destroyed because of the "un-realized" losses they were going to take. A lot of people felt that if you didnt' intend on selling this investments and if you could maintain and hold long-term that it was really really stupid for people to have to completely write-off the investments value, thus creating even worse financial statements, and when those reports come out, they'll continue to push the economy further and further into the s***ter. And that is where the hardest part lied, these investments that aren't readily traded that have estimated values which are only being sold in distressed markets so companies were claiming geeze, I got to right off 20B just to get to the value, but that is the value of a distressed market and the actual value really (If I held and utilized my cash-flows i'd earn) is 40B. That is why we heard all about mark-to-market for a while during the initial crash.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 04:49 PM) Then how are they judging if the asset valuations are accurate? I actually edited my original post to include more info and have made a 2nd post on the subject.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 04:49 PM) Then how are they judging if the asset valuations are accurate? To determine whether an asset value is correct, it depends on a whole slew of things and has to do with the valuation rules regarding investments (again part of FASB 157 and 117). It depends heavily on the type of security. If it is a publicly traded stock, easy, it is the ticker. If it is an equity fund that isn't readily traded, you typically get audited financial statements and utilize those to help determine the value of your investment (3 month lag is acceptable so if I was a company I'd most likely be utilizing the 9/30 interim statements as my mark to market for my 12/31/09 financial's; However a company needs to have a written policy if they are following that). Depending on the degree of difficulty you might need to go to an independent pricing service who will appriase the security and give you a rough estimate as to the value of the stock and than the company will document why they took the price they did (and we the auditors would than review it). If it is something where the intent to hold it is long-term, than it is a little different as you'd do a recover-ability test looking more at the future cash flow's, etc, but other triggers might force you to ignore the future cash flows and still write down to present value based upon various analysis). None of the above things I say have anything to do with SOX. Sure, under SOX, the company needs to document the controls they have in place to ensure that all of there securities are appropriately valued, but they only have to do that because guidance exists (and existed well prior to SOX) that you need to mark to market. Mark-to-market changed a bit in 2006 (mainly relating to the support needed and how to value investments without a readily determinable fair value) as did the disclosure requirements, but it also existed well before SOX was ever out there.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 04:44 PM) mark to market is the standard by which those controls are judged. No it is not. I know mark-to-market accounting like the back of my hand and there is zero correlation between mark-to-market accounting and SOX. Do you need controls to ensure you perform mark-to-market accounting on your investments, definitely. But you also need controls to ensure you safeguard your cash and a bagillion other things associated with revenue cycles, payroll cycles, etc. SOX did not create new accounting guidance (ie, how you account for something). SOX looked at things from the operational perspective to ensure controls were in place to prevent fraud, follow GAAP, and basically prevent significant mistatements. A Change to mark-to-market accounting solely has to do with an adjustment to GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles). As I mentioned, FASB 157 was the latest and greatest on mark to market accounting and SOX had zero impact on why FASB 157 came out. 157 came out because we were at a time where numerous companies were invested in securities, derivatives, mortgage loans which were under value and had very difficult to determine market values. Therefor we needed to find better ways to disclose and account for these investments and 157 did that. The 157 disclosure in the 10K's (Annual Financials) are now very massive and the reason is to make the investments very transparent. I was on calls for hours and hours at a time while we were speculating on what the "White papers" were going to say regarding 157 because I tested and audited investment's for a few years. Our financials of the company we audited literally changed 30 times because the disclosure requirements kept getting adjusted before everything was finally finalized.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 02:40 PM) It sure sounds like they're talking about some sort of newly negative statements about him coming from somewhere within the org. They have made adjustments to shorten his swing. Basically put, he's spending the year in the minors working on a decent overhaul to his swing so that he'll be able to succeed at the major league level (if he can make the adjustments). We shall see.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 12:48 PM) Did you get my donation in the mail? I don't want a pat on the back, just to make sure Uncle Sam's mail department didn't steal the loot. Got it in the mail last night. Thanks Greg

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 11:49 AM) Oh I know. I've been an Internal Auditor since 2001. What company you work for again? I've just moved into internal audit from external? Did you work in public prior to going into IA?

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 11:38 AM) QFT The key things that came out of SOX: 1. SOX 404 - Companies had to attest to there control environment (read up on COSO to learn more about the Control Environment) and the auditors than evaluated the controls as well and issued an opinion on the controls (much like we issue an opinion on the financial statements). 2. Public Accounting Oversight Committee - The audit firms actually got audited by a public department (in the past they were peer reviewed). Those public findings are documented and failures can become public knowledge (thus impacting our business). 3. Management had additional responsibility and the answer "We didn't know about it" wasn't good enough.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 11:37 AM) Mark to market comes about because of SOX. Companies have to report asset valuations accurately in real time. Sox had nothing to do with mark to market. Mark to Market Accounting began in 1993 with FAS 115 (well before Sox). It was than superseded by FAS 157 which came out in 2006 (4 years after Sox). FAS 157 came out due to the situation's associated with the beginning of the Mortgage/Real Estate crisis, not Sox. FAS 157's big impact was associated with the disclosures and types of analysis that needed to be performed on those hard to "value" securities which don't have readily determined market values. I'm really really familiar with FAS 157 because I was in charge of auditing the entire mortgage loan portfolio with a company which had 111B in total assets, 4B of which were mortgage loans.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 11:04 AM) It is all related. Because of SOX when a bank makes a loan, they have to always have the value of their loan reported on their books. If they are giving out loans below market value, they have to report them as losses, which is counted as a negative against their capital requirements with the FDIC. The subsidy is the payment from the government to make up the difference so that the banks can stay in business while making these sorts of loans. The federal government isn't subject to SOX, so it doesn't matter what the loan's actual worth is. They don't need the subsidy in other words. Hey Mike What you are referring to above has no relevance to SOX. Sox was purely something created to ensure companies evaluated there controls and ultimately appropriately had the necessary controls in place to prevent from Fraud. IT also added a lot of responsibility to upper management to sign off and basically was set-up as a giant CYA for things like Enron. I'm a little confused as to what accounting guidance you are referring to Mike, but my assumption is you are thinking about the mark-to-market?

Tim Floyd rejoins the college ranks. I'd have hired him in a heartbeat.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Mar 27, 2010 -> 06:07 PM) 18 perfectos, and 4 20-K games. I go with Wood's though. I would rather throw a perfect game vs. striking out 20, but if we are comparing Buehrle's perfect game to Woods, I go with Woods. Wood only allowed 2 baserunners, and did not allow a run. Both resulted in a win. Buehrle allowed 2 less baserunners, but Wood struck out what, 12 more batters? And had there been even decent defense at 3B, Wood's 20K game would have also been a no-hitter. I have to go with Wood, such a dominant performance.

QUOTE (SHIPPS @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 08:45 AM) Yeah, SHE works fast on finding a place and getting it set up. LOL. I did nothing. I think she is putting in the proposal to the Palms today. We are gonna book it for 40 to 50 people(small). You are on the list brother along with Jeanette. BTW I still havent got your invitation to your wedding I have been looking for it since you said you were sending them out. Some went in the mail today, another set tomorrow, and than the final set on Thursday so they haven't gone out. They'll be over shortly Miami should be fun!!! Never been.

QUOTE (SHIPPS @ Mar 30, 2010 -> 06:53 AM) Real nice ass munches. lol The date is set to Oct 9th and it looks like it will be at The Palms in Miami on the beach. Pretty sweet. Damn, you all work fast on finding the place. Miami should be fun. How many peeps coming? You guys already book the venue?