|
||||||
 | ||||||
| ||||||
I’m writing about once a month for a journal of friends called Sundayed. It gives me a chance to stretch my wings and write about topics other than the accounting industry.
I hope you’ll take a look.
“…I attribute much of what I’ve accomplished to measurement, first and foremost. I’ve used Statcounter.com as a primary metrics tool since [...]
Call me incredulous, but the Big 4’s public relations professionals may be on to something. Set the bar low, tell us what the Big 4 can’t do, won’t do, want to make you believe they have no responsibility to do, and maybe everyone will leave them alone. Then they can go back to making money [...]
Startups, especially on the West Coast, are usually full of folks who’ve been involved in more than one. Sometimes that’s due to success – the company is acquired – and sometimes that’s because of failure. Startup junkies are always moving. The Zynga management team includes several alumni, including their CEO and CFO, of SupportSoft.
SupportSoft’s founder who is the current Zynga CEO, and Zynga’s CFO, have been out of SupportSoft for a while. Within five minutes I knew why. SupportSoft settled a class action law suit in 2007 for $10.7 million that alleged its then-CEO and CFO, Radha Basu and Brian Beattie, violated federal securities laws. They were accused of making false and misleading statements about the reasons for record revenues, resulting in the artificial inflation of the company’s stock price.
The global money center banks are masters at managing financial reporting. Regulators repeatedly feign surprise at balance sheet sleight of hand, prestidigitation at the expert level intended to buy time until the banks can grow out of the black hole that bubble lending put them in. They announce their quarterly results, with all the details – they don’t even try to hide them anymore – and they’re ignored or the con is traded on for short term profits. We’ve yet to see the auditors called to testify to explain their role in blessing fraudulent bank balance sheet accounting.
Isn’t it about time?
Just for fun, fellow blogger and Twitter-aficionado Paul Kedrosky asked on the Twitter what people thought was the best book they had read so far of 2010. Here are some responses – perhaps a few ideas for your summer reading.
Joseph Cassano, the former head of AIG’s Financial Products Group, testified for the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission. PricewaterhouseCoopers has been playing consigliere to AIG for many, many years and continues to be allowed to act as their “independent” auditor in spite of the fact that they have been sued by AIG’s shareholders and are now turning their own partners against their client in court.
If PwC was informed about Cassano’s activities, then perhaps the SEC, the PCAOB and Department of Justice should finally turn their attention towards the audit firm. PwC has $312 million reasons to go along with the charade of independence.
The House – Senate Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act Conference reconvened on Tuesday, June 15 and Compliance Week says a version of the Specter Bill – to repeal the Supreme Court’s Stoneridge decision – will not be included in whatever comes out of the process. However, a coalition of state regulators, public pension funds, professors, consumers and investors and the attorneys who advise them, are still working to put something back in the bill as an amendment to restore the right of investors to defend themselves and hold white collar criminals accountable.
I was invited to talk with Delaware Senator Ted Kaufman (D) and his staff last week about accounting industry reform. It’s not every day that a regular girl from Chicago has a chance to talk with a sitting US Senator about the subject most important to her.
No… I’m not talking about Rosie, my Rott.
I’m talking about the auditors’ role in the financial crisis and their place in the regulatory reform bills now being considered.
So picture this scene…
KPMG is negotiating with the Department of Justice about its troubles while Department of Justice is negotiating with KPMG, their auditors, regarding their audits of DOJ financial statements. Given the major issues in found at DOJ during fiscal year 2004, DOJ must negotiate a way to get KPMG to show that there is some improvement and that they are not in violation of federal regulations and other such bothersome requirements. Who had the leverage here? I would venture to guess that in addition to the “too few to fail” doctrine at work here, there was also an attitude on the part of KPMG of, “Hey DOJ losers, who are you to call us a mismanaged, uncontrolled mess?”
On Monday night I saw the press release naming me as a finalist for the 2010 Gerald Loeb Award for Distinguished Business and Financial Journalism in the Online Commentary/Blogging category. I’m thrilled.
 Francine McKenna (@retheauditors) has more than twenty years of experience in consulting and professional services including tenure at two Big 4 firms, both in the US and abroad. For more info, click the "About" page link at the bottom of this page. |
|
