Financial Services

The financial services sector is faced with complex and continuously evolving challenges. More than ever, the industry must comply with far-reaching regulatory changes while maintaining the transparency and accountability that the public and investors require.

This sector must also stay in step with the fast pace of our increasingly technological lives, which drives the need for constant innovation in products and services. With this extensive use of technology, risk management becomes critical as flexibility and ease-of-access must be balanced with cutting-edge security for sensitive financial data.

In order to meet these regulatory and technological demands, it is vital to work with an accounting firm with a deep knowledge of the industry’s specific needs. The LaPorte Financial Services Industry Group has more than 30 years of experience providing timely and responsive service to this highly regulated services sector. As one of our first formal industry practices, our Financial Services Industry Group is a regional leader serving community-based financial institutions and multinational and FINRA-registered broker dealers. In addition, our registration with the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board allows us to serve publicly traded companies and broker-dealers that are regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Industry group team members become entrenched with our clients, serving the entire lifecycle of their needs including mergers and acquisitions, going public, or in risk and controls evaluations related to new products, services or transactions, to name a few.

Through our focus on efficient audits and coordination across our multidisciplinary team of audit, tax, and consulting professionals, we are able to provide timely and comprehensive financial and regulatory counseling, as well as fraud forensics and IT audits.

Services to industry

• Assistance with IPO and mutual-to-stock conversions
• Audit committee and board education
• Benefit plan audits
• Compliance audits pertaining to audit requirements established by HUD
• Cost segregation studies
• Deferred compensation plans
• Executive compensations reviews
• Financial statement audits
• Human resources assistance
• Internal control evaluations
• IT risk and controls assessments
• Mergers and acquisitions
• Prepaid expense acceleration
• Review of quarterly filings for public financial institutions
• SSAE 16 (SOC 1) reports
• Strategic planning
• Tax planning, including bad-debt deduction and multi-state issues
• Tax return preparation