This month, our main interview is with Hassnain Raza FCCA, who has two roles – the first as group CFO of international hemp-based drinks group St Peter’s Spirits, the second as co-founder of Silver Crown Royalties, a listed royalty and streaming company, both based in Toronto. Describing his journey from the Southern Punjab of Pakistan to Toronto, Canada, Raza says: ‘Success isn’t defined by where you stand today, but by how far you’ve travelled from where you began.’
We are also delighted to publish an article penned by the president of the European Court of Auditors – Tony Murphy FCCA has dedicated most of his career to public sector audit, first in Ireland and now EU-wide. But his mission remains the same – to reinforce trust in a prosperous, democratic and secure EU. Find out more about his work.
Staying in Europe, we learn that Italy is moving to narrow the VAT gap, especially in the retail sector, as from January a new law will require Italian retailers to report daily sales and the corresponding digital payments to tax authorities, cutting opportunities for VAT evasion and off-the-books sales. While the tax authorities will undoubtedly be clear winners, there will also be opportunities for accountancy firms looking to help their clients tackle the additional reporting requirements. Read how Italy is cashing in on the changes.
In Canada, the prime minister Mark Carney is trying to unlock growth by tearing down internal economic barriers. Canada is often viewed as a single, unified economy, but in practice it operates more like a patchwork of 13 partially separate markets. A former Bank of England governor, Carney has set out to change this through the One Canadian Economy Act. Find out how Carney is trying to unite the Canadian economy.
Organisations in Europe continue to invest in artificial intelligence, but the payback remains slow, according to an analysis by Deloitte. The Big Four firm reports that a typical AI use case takes two to four years to realise a return on investment, not the seven to 12 months that many traditional tech investments yield. Only 6 % of respondents reported payback in under a year; even among the most successful projects, just 13 % saw returns within 12 months. Read how slow AI payback is.
Talking of AI, criminal methodology is evolving dramatically thanks to AI advancements. From romance scams to multimillion-pound deepfake video conference frauds, financial crime is on the rise. A recent ACCA report, Combatting fraud in a perfect storm, suggests that fraud is no longer a collection of separate risks, but an interconnected storm system. Cyber tools are amplifying all types of fraud and a single weak link in a value chain can trigger cascading failures across multiple entities. Find out about the impact of fraud.
This report is also discussed in one of the sessions at this year’s Virtual Public Sector Conference. Register to watch on demand. Both this and ACCA’s annual virtual conference, Accounting for the Future, offer free CPD units. If you’re looking for more as the deadline looms, see our CPD articles.
