Nawrocki Smith

Originally developed as the backbone for the cryptocurrency Bitcoin, blockchain technology is showing itself to be useful in a variety of other applications, especially in the financial sector. The technology behind blockchain may be difficult for some people to understand, and we won’t get too bogged down with specifics in this short blog post, but here are the basics: Blockchain is a distributed database, which means pieces of it are located on different computers. The records within the database are called blocks. Each block contains a timestamp and a link to the previous block. Blocks are managed by a peer-to-peer protocol, which must

Economic losses are calculated to the “present value” to quantify a steady stream of lost past and lost future income into a single, lump-sum figure for settlement or award purposes. The present value of the economic losses is also considered “the replacement value” related to the event (injury, loss of life). In order to present his/her case, the plaintiff must show that a wrongful event has occurred and that he/she has suffered measurable damages, as a result. Establishing economic damages would include the following 5 essential elements: •Loss of Earning Capacity - Base/earning capacity (what was earned or could have

For six straight years, the number of audits conducted by the Internal Revenue Service has decreased. In 2016, the rate at which people were audited fell 16% from the previous year, with about 0.7% of all taxpayers facing higher scrutiny of their returns. Digging deeper into the statistics, one can see that the higher the taxpayer’s income, the greater the chance of being audited. For example, taxpayers earning over $200,000 per year were audited at a rate of 5.8%, meaning they were over eight times more likely to be audited than the population as a whole. This good news for

The act or process of determining the value of a business enterprise or ownership interest therein is called “business valuation.” It takes a high degree of skill and professional expertise to place a dollar value on businesses which are comprised of both tangible and intangible assets. Certified Public Accountants (CPAs) use a standard issued by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) when conducting business valuations. The standard that CPAs use is called the Statement on Standards for Valuation Services No. 1 (SSVS1). The valuation of closely-held businesses first became an issue as a result of Prohibition. In

What is fraud? In criminal law, fraud is intentional deception made for personal gain or to damage another individual. Fraud is a crime, but it is also a civil tort under common law. There are two main types of fraud: 1. Occupational Fraud - The use of one’s occupation for personal enrichment through the deliberate misuse or misapplication of the organization’s resources or assets. 2. Consumer Fraud - Schemes devised to defraud individuals, like identity theft, Ponzi schemes, phishing schemes, and advanced-fee schemes. The “fraud triangle” is a concept that was first introduced by criminologist Donald R. Cressey. He came

In Hardy v. Commissioner, an important, recently decided tax case, the Tax Court found that the share of income received by a doctor due to his ownership in a surgery center may not be subject to self-employment tax. Dr. Hardy was a plastic surgeon specializing in pediatric reconstructive surgery. He bought a minority interest in a surgery center run through an LLC. The opinion in the case held that he did not have self-employment income on his share of the center’s income. It found that Hardy had no meaningful non-surgery related service responsibilities with the surgery center and never

As we discussed in our last article, Current Procedural Terminology Codes (CPTs) are the language with which America’s healthcare billing system communicates. They convey everything from the types of procedures performed to the billing amount for office visits. Another extremely important use for CPTs is that they serve as the basis for calculating Relative Value Units, or RVUs. RVUs are a measure of value used by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) in the reimbursement formula for physician services. They can also be used in a number of other ways. A physician has run his own medical

Current Procedural Terminology (CPT) codes are numerical representations of procedures, pharmacological interventions, lab tests and any other service provided by a doctor or other healthcare provider. They are the uniform communicators of medical billing and practice analysis. The codes are broken down into ranges not unlike the Dewey decimal system: Evaluation & Management (99201-99499) Anesthesiology (00100-01999, 99100-99140) Surgery (10021-69990) Radiology (70010-79999) Pathology & Lab (80048-89356) Medicine (90281-99199, 99500-99602) The codes are painstakingly specific, and as a result, it is possible to tell a lot about a physician’s occupation activity from them. This becomes extraordinarily useful when disability insurers are addressing physicians’ claims; they want to

“Brexit,” though it might sound like some type of medieval disease, is a brand-new word in the English language. To some it may mean “opportunity,” to others “disaster,” yet its dictionary definition will always be “the British withdrawal from the European Union.” The European Union (EU) is basically a club with benefits among 28 (soon to be 27) European nations, based on four freedoms: The freedom to move goods The freedom to provide services The freedom of workers to move between the EU countries The freedom to move capital amongst those countries Britain’s* referendum on whether to leave or remain within the

Service Organization Control (SOC) Engagements Formerly known as the SAS70, the Service Organization Control (SOC®) reports convey confidence in your internal controls over financial reporting of your business to your customers and their auditors. They also can provide information regarding your controls related to security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality and privacy. This information is helpful in regulatory, compliance initiatives as well as demonstrating to prospective customers that you care about the security and privacy of the information and tasks they entrust with you. The 3 main reasons why the SOC® has replaced the SAS70: The world has changed and there