I was at New York University’s Vincent C. Ross Institute of Accounting Research to speak on a panel that included Paul Volcker, Bob Herz and a lawyer representing PwC and EY. The Ross Roundtable on the “Impact of Reemergence of Consulting Practices at Major Audit Firms” was well attended.
HP announced today it is writing down more than $5 billion, or almost half of the Autonomy acquisition price, because of “serious accounting improprieties, misrepresentation and disclosure failures” by Autonomy former executives. Deloitte was the auditor of Autonomy, a UK software firm acquired by HP in 2011 for $11.1 billion.
The SEC is busy chasing Ponzi schemers and foreign bribers. But bogus accounting remains a bigger danger to the markets. (More links.)
My column at American Banker last week focused on the latest PCAOB inspection report for KPMG. We’ve got three more “Big Four” inspections reports to come – Ernst & Young, Deloitte and PwC. Don’t be surprised if you see the same focus on loan loss and repurchase reserves and the same kinds of auditor deficiencies.
Jeff Connaughton’s new book, “The Payoff: Why Wall Street Always Wins”, is a must read during the Presidential election season.
Is this really the way to run a professional services firm?
Crain’s Chicago Business reported yesterday that Dan Ustian, Chairman, CEO, and President of Navistar was unceremoniously dumped and has also left the board. It’s about time.
The day my OpEd in the Financial Times was published, July 30, there were many other stories in other publications marking the occasion of Sarbanes-Oxley’s tenth anniversary. Most of them focused on the lack of prosecutions of CEOs and CFOs for false financial statement certification crimes.
I have an opinion piece in the Financial Times today in honor of the tenth anniversary of Sarbanes-Oxley on July 30.
The Huron Consulting case is a great one if you would like to see examples of almost everything that’s wrong with the audit industry, the regulation of the industry and “reforms” like Sarbanes-Oxley.
My latest column at American Banker was published online on Monday and discussed some of the reasons, I think, why bank auditors are missing or consciously ignoring increased risk and poor to no controls.
I’ve put a new column up at Forbes this morning, “Barclays Manipulates Libor While Auditor PwC Snoozes.”
The Barclays Libor manipulation scandal is a big deal and we haven’t yet seen the full impact here in the U.S. The Chairman of the bank resigned officially this morning and the interim Chairman is none other than our old friend Sir Mike Rake, former Global Chairman of KPMG.
