Financial Statement Fraud Defined

In this new century, financial statement fraud has increasingly become a serious problem for business, government, and investors. In fact, the issue threatens to undermine the confidence of capital markets and corporate leaders. Auditors, in particular, have been hit hard for their seeming inability to find fraud on a massive scale. Monetary damages and settlement judgments in the hundreds of millions of dollars against auditing firms have become commonplace, and one of the largest auditing firms, Arthur Andersen, has completely disappeared.

Now fully updated and filled with up-to-date case examples, Financial Statement Fraud, Second Edition not only explains in understandable language how financial schemes are committed, it also offers valuable advice on how to prevent and detect them. The Second Edition is written specifically with publicly held companies in mind—and packed with guidance from standard-setting organizations such as the PCAOB, AICPA, and the SEC, providing theoretical and practical advice ideally suited for you—whether you are a manager or an auditor—to help you recognize and stop financial statement fraud.

The Second Edition continues to focus on the importance of corporate governance in preventing and detecting financial statement fraud, with the latest coverage on:

• Examinations of real-world frauds and practical tools and techniques for carrying out their antifraud responsibilities

• Initiatives affecting the financial reporting and corporate governance and auditing functions, such as SOX- and SEC-related implementation rules

• Recommendations from the SEC Advisory Committee to reduce the complexity of the financial reporting process and improve the quality of financial reports

• Emerging financial reporting and auditing initiatives, including movement toward IFRS and IAAS and the use of the XBRL reporting platform

• Corporate governance reforms in the post-SOX era, including provisions of the SOX Act, global regulations and best practices, ethical considerations, and corporate governance principles

Straightforward and clear, this superior reference provides you with an up-to-date understanding of financial statement fraud, including its deterr-ence, prevention, and detection. Its uncomplicated language illustrates theoretical and practical con-cepts and procedures to aid comprehension of complex financial reporting processes and expos-ure to a variety of fraudulent activities.