Isn’t it interesting how our fair President has some harsh words for the perpetraitors of the Worldcom mess? Seemed to have a little different front up when Enron imploded eh?
Granted it’s very wrong when corporate money laundering goes on in public companies on this level…but it happens…apparently. I’m sure there’s plenty more companies that have been doing it as well in the meantime. We’ll probably hear some more companies with the “we’ve been glossing our accounting too” soon I’m thinking. Xerox maybe huh?
So mister President, how about you get a little more proactive here and rather than playing the drama help get some goverment regulation in place to prevent this massive fraud? Put a little effort into making the stock market and our economy a more stable place; rather then spending another half trillion dollars on a witchhunt looking for some guy beating off in a cave. :rolleyes:
Except what Bush said in March was a watered down version of what Arthur Levitt (then Chair of the SEC) proposal two years ago. That was before he got shot down by the Auditing Industry’s purchase of Congress.
IMHO, it isn’t the Auditing Industry that needs reform as much as the lobbying and campaign contributions Industry - this is a classic case of the public interest coming a very poor second to vested corportae interests.
BTW, Bush doesn’t have to “press Congress”. It’s a done deal for which he’d like to claim credit.
What about all those investment banks that gave Enron a favourable stock analysis in exchange for large investment banking fees for their M&A advisory business?
“Chinese Walls” is obviously a new concept to these people.
Oooh ‘Chinese Wall’, them’s were the days…You know, there’s an argument doing the rounds at the moment that says general principles (for example, the UK) are a whole lot more difficult to circumvent than rules (US accounting practices/standards) - I’m out of the game so won’t comment. It might just be smug ‘we told you so’s’.
However, I’m not sure the proposed US reforms do shift away from rules to (amongst other things) more ethics-aware standards, the latter do seem to have been more successful, thus far, in the deregulated markets.
Anyhow some serious change needs to be implemented and I wish Bush would get the ball rolling more. Well then again, maybe the problem really isn’t Bush and more the people surrounding him. Hopefully somebody will wake up, pull the right string and advise him better on the tasks that he should be moving on. shakes head
Sure I would rather just sit here and shake my head.
The alternative is a waste of my time and wont make any significant difference. If you disagree, and think you can individually make a difference in an issue like this, please go ahead. I’m rooting for you personally.
Money laundering? Who said anything about money laundering?
It’s not like WorldCom or Xerox were selling arms to Iran and then using the profits to fund the Contras or anything. Just some accounting that deviated from standard practices.
I, too, am appalled. I think a lot needs to be done, before people decide they can’t trust public companies anymore, pull out of stocks en masse and start dumping more $$$ into alternatives like real estate. Sure, we need more stringent rules concerning how revenue gets recognized on the books of public companies, but we also need…
To come down hard on auditors who cut “wink wink nudge nudge” deals with executive management. No one can tell me that Andersen didn’t know about the BS with WorldCom. I’ve worked for public companies and had to deal with auditors. The competent ones are ALWAYS asking about how revenue should be classified - when it is earned, etc.
To hold company officers PERSONALLY LIABLE when they pull stuff like this. If a CFO can pull stuff like this off, there will always be a few that will try. There’s little financial risk to them, from a personal perspective, because they can hide behind the veil of protection that a corporation provides. I think WorldCom’s CFO should be thrown in jail and should have to pay fines out of his own pocket as part of the penance WorldCom should have to do after screwing up so royally.
To negate profits made by executive management by selling stock, exercising options, taking bonuses, etc. that wouldn’t have been possible had the company posted accurate financial statements instead of bullshit.
Of course, that’s just my opinion. I could be wrong. . . Nah, make that “I probably AM wrong.”
Meant money laundering in the sense of illegally recycling money behind the scenes, not literally “money laundering”. Sorry bout the confusion.
I’m all for making an example out of the people defrauding the public as well. Seems Anderson as a whole was a bit of a scapegoat for the whole Enron fiasco, though. Misplaced blame or not?
Still boggles me that huge companies like this are going under at the public’s expense for shit dealings made within a few departments.
Well, what worldcom did was pretty much the same accounting bullshit that bush himself benefited from back when he sold his shares in Harken Oil. Cheney pulled the same shit at Halburtan. Just business as usual until it gets too far out of hand.
