CPE & Event Calendar

We all make predictions in our personal and professional lives. We base our decisions to marry, buy a house, launch a new product or hire staff on expectations about the future. In the past few years, research into improving predictions has advanced. We will look at this research and current best practices in forecasting to help us prepare better budgets and projections. 

The most recent recession and its fallout, weather (look at 2017), process and product failures, and unethical behavior have again highlighted failures by numerous organizations in identifying and managing risk. The size and reputation of organizations proved not to be the key to success. Again, we saw that failures can result in areas/industries thought to be "under control" through their policies, practices and/or regulations. A core activity of financial management is to effectively protect the assets of their organizations, without significantly reducing new ideas and growth. This brief program provides insights and approaches to identify risk and manage the above noted trade-off. The course is designed for financial managers looking to quickly build upon their existing knowledge and experience, as well as to help to start the less experienced individual. It offers ideas that can be used immediately, as well as longer term approaches. Updated to include new information particularly in the areas of disaster planning, business continuity, and ethics, as well as a sample group exercise to test your current risk management systems.

This course emphasizes the practical application of incident response frameworks through case studies of AI-related cyber incidents. It focuses on preparing financial professionals to effectively manage and learn from cybersecurity crises.

Schedule 1-A is a new tax form designed to consolidate four key OBBBA deductions that can be taken for the first time in 2025. Ultimately these four deductions: the tip deduction, the overtime deduction, the deduction for interest paid on a new car loan, and the senior deduction, appear as a single entry on line 13b of Form 1040. These deductions are phased out at higher income levels, the calculation of which takes place on Schedule 1-A. Accounting and finance professionals who wish to understand the mechanics of the four deductions and how they are expressed on Schedule 1-A and consolidated on Form 1040 would benefit from taking this program.

Cash flow management is often the most important task of any CFO or financial leader. Regardless of whether one works in start-ups or established companies, non-profit or for-profit entities, cash flow makes our organizations run. Have you ever wondered whether you are optimizing your company's cash flow? In this course, we will explore how to improve your company's cash flow using analysis and financial theories in the context of real-world situations. This event may be a rebroadcast of a live event and the instructor will be available to answer your questions during the event.

As experienced staff members master the preparation intricacies of an 1120-S tax return, they are expected to understand and apply the underlying concepts, principles and laws governing S corporation status. This course is designed to illustrate in both theory and practice overarching principles that govern S corporations from formation to revocation, termination and liquidation. Experienced, client-facing staff should be aware of the pitfalls that may inadvertently cause an S-status termination or may generate unintended tax consequences to shareholders.

Numerous fraud cases point out that it doesn't take a sophisticated level of complexity to steal from an organization. Fraud is intended to be hidden and thus can very easily meet its target to deceive. Fraud has a pervasive role in today's corporate environment, and organizations that choose to ignore fraud risk or disregard its impact become a fraudster's opportunity. This course will provide the professional with valuable knowledge about fraud risk and various best practices in fraud prevention programs designed to mitigate such risk. The course will also provide an introduction to fraud investigations and forensic accounting and is ideal for the professional seeking to expand his or her knowledge base and who may be at a mid-level position within an organization with operational or supervisory responsibilities, or both.

An innovative and interactive session that taps the areas of neuroscience, psychology and biology to understand how science, emotion and ethical decision-making interact. Instead of critiquing how our minds are supposed to work, this session delves into the fascinating world of how our minds work when we face complex problems where a "best choice" doesn't seem to exist. The talk will also explore why ethical codes have often failed and how to improve individual and organizational ethical reasoning.

Stay current on recent changes in accounting and auditing. Review Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB), U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Private Company Council (PCC), Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) and American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) standard-setting activity in the current year. Implementation dates will be provided so you can plan for changes, and the course will highlight the changes that will be implemented in the current year. Also, we'll discuss the difference between public and private company requirements.

This course is a comprehensive overview of critical Federal tax law updates resulting from changes to current laws, regulations and court cases impacting all business entity types, including S corporations, Partnerships, C corporations and Sole Proprietorships. We will also review recent modifications to tax forms, small business tax law and administrative updates, retirement plan changes and tax practice and procedures.

A discussion of the latest tax developments impacting individual taxpayers, with a focus on important provisions, rules and concepts. This event may be a rebroadcast of a live event and the instructor will be available to answer your questions during the event.

Overview: Understanding your company's financial health requires more than just traditional metrics. This webinar is designed to reveal deeper insights through advanced, underutilized financial ratios. In this session, accounting and finance professionals will explore metrics such as operating leverage, free cash flow yield, and margin of safety-tools that go beyond standard ratios to deliver nuanced perspectives on profitability, risk exposure, and operational efficiency. This event may be a rebroadcast of a live event and the instructor will be available to answer your questions during the event.

There have been many changes in SBA lending in the past years and we are expecting more this year.  This presentation will be an overview of SBA financing rules with any updates and a chance to ask questions.  Financing through the SBA, small business administration, allows a smaller or in some instances no down payment, a longer term, a collateral shortfall and is the difference between getting the loan and not getting the loan.  The SBA 7(a) program is frequently used for business acquisition financing, partner buyouts or partial buyouts and the SBA 504 loan program is frequently used for acquisition of fixed assets, majority owner-occupied commercial real estate or equipment with a life of 10 years or longer. 

We all know that Fraud Happens. But, why? Why do people we think we can trust let us down? This session will explore the minds of white-collar criminals and examine some recent high-profile fraud cases. Why did they do it? How did they do it? What were the warning signs? If you think that fraud cannot happen to your organization, this session might give you pause.

Stay current on FASB's activities, with this  LIVE  quarterly update. This course delivers an overview of Accounting Standards Updates (ASU) released over the past three months (up to the course delivery date) and addresses proposed ASUs issued and the deadline for comments. The course also covers changes to the FASB Workplan. Be sure to register for each quarterly update: FASB Update: What's New in Q1 - August 2026 FASB Update: What's New in Q2 - October 2026 FASB Update: What's New in Q3 - January 2027 FASB Update: What's New in Q4 - April 2027

Ethics are of central importance to the CPA profession. But what do we mean by ethics? Is it just appropriate behavior, compliance with laws, or is it more than that? In this course, we'll discover what sets ethics apart and, therefore, sets the profession apart as well. We'll explore the tools available, the role of bias, and dive into real life case studies. We'll apply the AICPA's ethical framework and detect where bias was involved in the case studies. We'll even discover that one person set the price tag on their ethics at $53.7 million, only to lose it all in the end. This event may be a rebroadcast of a live event and the instructor will be available to answer your questions during the event.

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) was a major overhaul of our tax system that lowered the income tax rates for individual and corporate taxpayers and introduced the new 20% qualified business income (QBI) deduction for sole proprietors and pass-through entities. The cornerstone of this course is the comprehensive discussion of the 20% QBI deduction final regulations under IRC §199A.      *Please Note:  If you need credit reported to the IRS for this IRS approved program, please download the IRS CE request form on the Course Materials Tab and submit to terri.storer@acpen.com    

Form 709 is filed by many tax practitioners but are frequently filed incorrectly. Especially troublesome is reporting the gift correctly on Schedule A, making the correct GST allocations and meeting the adequate disclosure requirements. This program will review common problems for preparers and provide examples of presentations for many of the frequently reported gifts in recent years.

The role of financial professionals has and continues to change in organizations. The stereotype of collecting and reporting data has been replaced by a broader vision, which focuses on improving an organization's results today and preparing it for the future. This brief program offers specific actions that can be implemented by financial personnel to expand their role through improving their organization. The actions and techniques provided build upon and improve activities that exist in many organizations (measuring, budgeting, hiring, risk management, etc.), as well as providing insights into capital allocation, cash management, valuation techniques, variables that influence capacity levels, M&A activity and actions to increase efficiency and innovation. Updated to include the impact of regulations, additional examples of M&A, alliances and strategic spin-offs/splits, methods to improve efficiency from existing activities, the impact of COVID-19, as well as current organizational changes employed to manage and accelerate growth.

Many tax clients with losses from their S corporations, partnerships, and multiple-member LLCs treated as partnerships will want to use these losses to offset their other income from other sources. This program explains when, why, and how the at-risk rules apply to allow or to prevent the owner of a pass-through entity from taking a loss from a pass-through entity and using it to offset other income. This program is extremely helpful for anyone with pass-through entity clients.