Speaker

Matt Waters

Matt Waters has more than 15 years of experience managing accounting and finance. He has worked with both small organizations and large public companies including The Home Depot and American Tower. His expertise includes process improvements and software evaluation for the new lease accounting guidance issued in early 2016 by the FASB and the IASB. While at The Home Depot, he led the project to consolidate data for real estate, equipment and other leased assets into a single department, which increased efficiency for the preparation of financial reports, 10K footnotes, budgets and forecasts. Organizing lease data in one area allowed the business to see patterns, eliminate waste, and make more informed decisions. Ultimately, his project enabled company-wide quality control over leased assets that reduced over-payments and other costs, which added money back to the bottom line. Mr. Waters has contributed to whitepapers and articles on the topic of lease accounting, and has been an invited participant at industry roundtables sponsored by leading accounting firms.  He has also led CPE events focused on lease accounting.  Since the new lease accounting standards were issued in 2016, Mr. Waters has focused his practice on helping clients prepare for the upcoming changes. Mr. Waters became a Certified Public Accountant in February 2004 and a Chartered Global Management Accountant in July 2012. He received an Undergraduate Degree in Accounting from Auburn University and a Master of Business Administration degree from the University of Alabama at Birmingham.