Detecting Accounting Fraud Before It's Too Late

Cover -- Title Page -- Copyright -- Contents -- Prologue -- Introduction -- Acknowledgments -- Chapter 1 Fraud and Accounting Manipulations -- 1.1 Fraud and Its Effects -- 1.2 Modifying Companies' Financial Information -- 1.3 Calling Things by Their Name: From Creative Accounting to Big Baths -- References -- Chapter 2 Accounting Fraud: An Ancient Practice -- 2.1 The First Accounting Frauds -- 2.2 Accounting Frauds Continue with the Double Entry -- 2.3 The Crash of 1929 and the Obligation to Audit Accounts -- 2.4 Reinforcement of the Commercial Law and Auditing After the String of Scandals of 2000 -- 2.5 With the Crisis of 2008, History Repeats Itself -- References -- Chapter 3 Problems with Legislation and Those Involved in the Financial Information -- 3.1 How Financial Information Is Generated -- 3.2 Auditing of Accounts: Essential, but Not Infallible -- 3.3 Analysts and Rating Agencies -- 3.4 Regulators and the Limitations of Accounting Regulations -- 3.5 Role of the Media -- References -- Chapter 4 Why Are Accounts Manipulated? -- 4.1 Motivation, Opportunity, and Rationalization -- 4.2 The Door to Fraud -- References -- Chapter 5 Legal Accounting Manipulations -- 5.1 Alternatives, Estimations, and Legal Gaps -- Transactions That Can Be Accounted for by Choosing Among Several Alternatives -- Uniformity -- Relative Importance -- Accounting Notes Based on Estimates That Imply a High Degree of Subjectivity -- Gaps in the Accounting Standards -- 5.2 Main Legal Manipulations -- 5.3 Impact of Legal Manipulations in the Accounts -- References -- Chapter 6 Illegal Accounting Manipulations -- 6.1 Accounting Crime -- 6.2 How Illegal Manipulations Are Done -- 6.3 Operations Through Tax Havens -- 6.4 Main Illegal Manipulations -- 6.5 Main Items Affected by Accounting Frauds -- References.