Changes to revenue recognition rules may be beneficial but will lead to accounting headaches that new software can relieve.
Last September, regulators issued new revenue recognition rules that allow companies to book product and service sales separately—a boost for the balance sheet, but a big accounting hassle. Prior to the new rules, effective 1Q of… Read the rest

Educators in post-secondary institutions, colleges and schools looking for lower costs, better controls and no age restrictions might consider switching from Second Life to its open source alternative, the OpenSim… Read the rest virtual world server platform.
The OpenSim server software can be used to power an entire public grid or a small private, behind-the-firewall installation, and can

Securing corporate IT systems is crucial, but there are ways to make that effort more productive and less costly.
Companies have spent years beefing up their information technology governance, risk and compliance systems.  With cutting costs now top of mind in corporate America, here are six ways to make IT GRC systems more productive and… Read the rest

Virtual events platform provider On24 has rolled out a suite of social networking tools… Read the rest this week, including integration with Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.
“We have a standard Twitter widget that can be embedded in a virtual event,” said Denise Persson, On24’s chief marketing officer. “You can see the conversation going on by people in the

Goldman Sachs, UBS and Société Générale all have been involved in the last year in high-profile cases involving alleged thefts of computer code used in their algorithmic trading strategies for their clients and their own objectives.
The lesson: Even the biggest and best of breed in high-speed, complex electronic trading need to review the procedures… Read the rest

After the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in 2002, many securities firms implemented financial controls to ensure the accuracy of financial statements. The new act required public companies to strengthen accounting controls and financial oversight.
Spreadsheets are difficult to control and audit. Many companies accelerated their migration to enterprise-quality databases and resource management systems that… Read the rest

New software products aim to help companies get the whip hand over ubiquitous but risky spreadsheets.
Concur Technologies helps companies automate the processes by which they manage employee travel and entertainment spending, but some of its own processes aren’t fully automated. “We’re like everyone,” says Terry DePolo, Concur’s director of accounting. “We’re trying to minimize… Read the rest

The theft of 15,000 records of HSBC Swiss account holders is “inexcusable,” according to a security expert  who provides consulting services to financial firms, and the bank should have taken steps to prevent the loss.
“As an HSBC customer, I’m appalled,” said Steve Markey, founder and principal of Philadelphia-based data security and privacy consulting firm… Read the rest

HSBC’s Swiss subsidiary HSBC Private Bank SA admitted Thursday that a former employee stole records on 15,000 clients and passed them to French government authorities.
The company apologized to its customers for the breach.
“We deeply regret this situation and unreservedly apologise to our clients for this threat to their privacy,” Alexandre Zeller, chief executive… Read the rest

Tokyo’s new Arrowhead trading platform has cut trading costs by more than a third, according to a report… Read the rest released this week by New York-based investment technology provider ITG Inc.
According to ITG, Japanese trading costs were 36 percent lower during the last two months compared to the December, falling from 49 to 31 basis points.