GSB Finance Roundtable

April 14, 6:00 PM - 8:30 PM

Audit Committee Financial Literacy: A Work in Progress

The NYSE and the NASD require, through their listing requirements, that every publicly traded company have an audit committee with financially literate members. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act requires public companies to have an Audit Committee Financial Expert. Are public firms meeting these standards? Just what is the definition of financial literacy? And does having a financially literate audit committee make a difference in the returns of the firm?

Prof. Roman Weil will present his recently completed research on the progress towards Audit Committee Financial Literacy. He will touch on key topics:

• What is the history of financial literacy?
• What is the meaning of financial literacy?
• How can we rate firms on their financial literacy capabilities?
• How did firms score in the ratings?
• How literate are individual board members?
• Do financially literate firms earn higher returns?

This session will examine the public policy results of a key aspect of corporate governance improvements. You will learn a method to rank financial literacy at your firm and across the corporate landscape and discover how financial literacy impacts the financial returns of firms.

Where:
Gleacher Center
Room 621
450 North Cityfront Drive
Chicago, Illinois
Map on how to reach Gleacher Center

Who:
Prof. Roman Weil
V. Duane Rath Professor of Accounting
University of Chicago Graduate School of Business

Cost:
No Charge but pre-registration is required.

Program:
5:30PM - 6:00PM : Sponsor Table Review
6:00PM - 7:30PM : Presentation and Formal Discussion
7:30PM - 8:30PM : Informal Discussion and Networking (Cash Bar)

Registration:
Register Online

Questions:
Vern Broders
Contact for Finance Roundtable
(312) 224-8507
vern.broders@chartermast.com

Speaker Profiles

ROMAN L. WEIL is Professor of Accounting at the GSB and serves as Director of its Directors’ Consortium, which trains corporate board members. This is a joint venture of Chicago, Stanford Law School and The Wharton School.

Professor Weil has been a CPA in Illinois since 1973 and a CMA since 1974. He has served on the faculties of the Georgia Institute of Technology, New York University Law School, at Stanford University in its Graduate School of Business, Economics Department and Law School, and at the University of Washington.

He has co-authored or co-edited numerous textbooks and professional reference books for Holt, Rinehart McGraw-Hill, Simon & Schuster, Prentice-Winston, The Dryden Press, Harcourt, Brace & Jovanovich, Thomson Learning, and for John Wiley, the Litigation Services Handbook. He has served as editor or associate editor of The Accounting Review, Management Science, Journal of Accounting and Economics, and the Financial Analysts Journal.

Prof. Weil served on the SEC Advisory Committee on Replacement Cost Accounting. At the FASB, he has served on task forces on consolidations and on interest methods. Prof. Weil also serves on the Board of Directors of mutual funds affiliated with New York Life Insurance Company and chairs the Audit Committee. Additionally Weil serves on the Investment Company Institute’s Independent Directors’ Council. He has consulted for a wide variety of corporate clients, including many members of the Fortune 500.

Weil received his BA in Economics and Mathematics from Yale University and both his MS in Industrial Administration and Ph.D. in Economics from Carnegie-Mellon University. He joined the faculty at the University of Chicago in 1965, where he has held positions in Mathematical Economics, Management and Information Sciences, Accounting, and in the Law School.