Lindsay High grad retiring as SEC Chief Accountant, made his mark | Photos

A leading financial administrator for the Securities and Exchange Commission known for not pulling any punches with local ties is retiring.

It was announced on Wednesday Paul Munter, a 1970 Lindsay High graduate, is retiring as the SEC’s Chief Accountant. His retirement will be effective January 24.

“I thank Paul for his leadership of the Office of the Chief Accountant, his counsel, and his clear accounting advice,” said SEC Chair Gary Gensler, who’s also leaving the agency that’s in charge of regulating the Stock Market. “As Chief Accountant, he led the office in the critical work of ensuring that investors have access to the highest-quality financial disclosures from public companies. I wish him the best in his retirement from federal service.”

Munter joined the SEC in 2019, was named Acting Chief Accountant in 2021, and was appointed Chief Accountant in January 2023.

As Chief Accountant Munter led the Commission’s oversight of the Financial Accounting Standards Board, which issued many standards to drive improvements in information for investors including disaggregation of income statement expenses, improvements in income tax disclosures and accounting for investments in crypto assets, the agency stated. Munter also led the Commission’s oversight of the activities of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, which issued a number of new or improved auditing standards related to quality control, use of other auditors, confirmations, and general responsibilities of the audit, the agency added.

During his tenure Munter published 22 statements and speeches addressing matters such as financial reporting issues by special purpose acquisition companies, materiality assessment, risk assessment, auditor independence, and audit firm culture.

“It has been the honor of my career to serve investors and our markets as the Chief Accountant for the past four-plus years and lead the outstandingly talented and dedicated professionals of the Office of the Chief Accountant,” Munter said.

Prior to arriving at the SEC, Munter was a senior instructor of accounting at the University of Colorado. He retired from KPMG, where he served as the lead technical partner for the U.S. firm’s international accounting and International Financial Reporting Standards activities and served on the firm’s international panel responsible for establishing firm positions on the application of IFRS.

Munter earned his Ph.D. in accounting from the University of Colorado. He received his bachelor’s and master’s in accounting from Fresno State. He’s a Certified Public Accountant in Colorado, New York, and Florida. Munter also served as an accounting professor at the University of Miami for 30 years and was the chairman of that university’s accounting department for 10 years.

As the SEC’s top accountant Munter’s guidance targeted crypto assets and led to hundreds of restatements during the SPAC boom. Munter is known as a prolific and articulate speaker who pulled no punches when it came to his views on financial reporting issues.

Munter is also known as being similar to Gensler and his talks were known at times as being “full-throated” when it came to detailing his support for robust rulemaking and financial reporting transparency serving investors as well as concerns the accounting industry was facing headwinds. He’s known as someone who didn’t pull punches when it came to sounding the alarm to controversial accounting issues that concerned him.

In July 2023 he called out the practice in which he said crypto companies pay for less precise reviews they then misrepresent to investors as audits. In a written statement, Munter warned accounting firms could be held legally liable for material misstatements made by clients when it came to crypto.

As the acting chief accountant in 2022 he criticized what he called the decline in the level of professionalism in employees at large accounting firms. As a speaker at a conference in New York City Munter expressed his belief accounting was more than just an industry, saying a lack of professionalism was leading to a lack of confidence in accountants and financial information investors use.

During that time in the June 2023, the SEC fined Ernst and Young $100 million for cheating by its auditors on ethics exams and for withholding evidence of wrongdoing from the SEC’s Enforcement Division.

During the peak of the Special Purpose Acquisition Company, SPAC wave, particularly in 2021, through Munter’s guidance “hundreds of restatements” were filed by companies that went public through SPAC mergers, primarily due to complex accounting issues related to warrants and other equity instruments, leading to a significant surge in financial restatements across the market as a whole.

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