Thomas Rees

Thomas Rees is a professor of practice in the Accounting department. Professor Rees has more than 35 years of diverse accounting experience, holding senior management positions in public accounting/consulting, with the federal government, and with private and public companies. Professor Rees is an expert in personal finance matters and teaches advanced accounting classes and financial literacy. 

Before joining the Lehigh faculty, Professor Rees was a Senior Managing Director at FTI Consulting, an international consulting firm, where he provided forensic accounting and SEC advisory and accounting consulting services to clients, including: 

• Determining the appropriate accounting treatment for complex transactions;
• Supporting client accounting approaches in response to SEC inquiries;
• Preparing disclosures and financial statements consistent with SEC requirements and generally accepted accounting principles (“GAAP”).

Rees worked closely with client counsel, leading forensic accounting investigations in response to whistleblower claims or allegations of fraud, and providing expert witness and litigation support services. Professor Rees also established and co-lead FTI’s Bank Regulation and Governance practice, providing a wide range of compliance, risk management, and operational risk services to assist financial institution clients in response to regulator examinations, investigations and consent orders. 

Previously, Rees was a Professional Accounting Fellow and the Deputy Chief Accountant at the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (“OCC”), the Division of the U.S. Treasury Department responsible for regulating national banks. Rees was responsible for developing and interpreting supervisory policy relating to accounting, auditing, capital markets, derivatives, regulatory capital, internal controls and risk management. He worked with representatives of the Financial Accounting Standards Board, SEC, AICPA, FDIC, and Federal Reserve to address emerging accounting issues and prepare comment letters on proposed accounting rules.  Pr. Rees represented the OCC in discussions with international bank supervisors and the Bank for International Settlements about accounting and development of new capital rules (Basel II).   

Earlier in his career, Rees was a Vice President at MBNA America (now Bank of America) where he held numerous management positions responsible for loan approval, customer service, quality assurance, process analysis, and project management. Rees also was a Vice President and Chief Accounting Officer at Penn Mutual Life Insurance where he established accounting policy, oversaw the mutual fund and broker-dealer operations, coordinated preparation of the company’s financial statements and managed relationships with external auditors, and rating agencies. Mr. Rees started his career at Arthur Andersen & Co. where he was a Senior Auditor. 

Professor Rees currently provides consulting services to law firms, consulting firms and corporate clients as an independent consultant.

Professor Rees is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA), Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA), Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE) and holds the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation.

Education

• Arizona State University, B.S.
• University of Delaware, M.B.A.

Practice Areas

• Forensic accounting and fraud investigation

• Litigation support (Expert witness and litigation consulting)

• SEC and Accounting Advisory Services

• Technical accounting research

• Financial institution regulation and governance

• Bank accounting consulting

• Personal finance/financial literacy