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To: golfinvestor who wrote (409)	8/20/2002 4:33:14 PM
From: TimbaBear	Respond to of 562

golfinvestor After reading your post, I would say the best we can do is agree that we disagree Perhaps. If your going to change the way options are accounted for and disallow proforma earnings reporting, then why not cleanup all the grey areas of accounting. I didn't suggest disallowing Pro-forma, I said its benefits have been abused to hide "one-time" expenses, and thus has been made unreliable as tool. There might be changes in reporting that would bring this manner of presentation back to some measure of usefulness. I do agree that the US Investor is presented with a rare opportunity to effect major changes in the way things are done by corporate America and should seize this moment and get all the changes made that need to be made. For example, many of the companies that have come out and said that they will now expense options have unfunded pension liability, which is as much of an expense as stock options are. I don't hear anybody crying to FASB to change that grey area of accounting. While stock options are robbing most of today's profits in many US Corporations, unfunded pension liabilities will rob tomorrow's profits at others. I have heard some motions toward more accurate accounting in pension funding, more reasonable assumptions regarding expected rates of return, and for not allowing "excess" returns to be counted as income. I'm all for the required changes in the pension area as well. The bottom line is if your going to change the accounting system, just don't pick a few areas and think it will make dishonest company honest, go all the way. Couldn't agree with you more! Make all companies report just one way for GAAP and for the IRS. I don't think that will work as the accrual stuff(depreciation, amortization, etc) does need different treatment. I'm sure there are a lot of other reasons as well, but I'm not an accountant. I think the reporting system we have gives more information than one would ever be able to get from a tax return. It just has some really major flaws that need to be addressed. I agree there are a lot of vested interests that will resist the changes that need to be made. Surprisingly some of the ones who would benefit most (shareholders), often don't see that accuracy in reporting is the one crucial foundation stone of this whole capitalistic system. Some shareholders seem to believe that if we can just keep the charade going long enough that this malaise will all blow over and they will recover their initial investments. Bear markets are known for exposing the charades and that's what happening in this one as well. Timba