Forensic Investment

Professional auditing standards discuss the three key “conditions” that are typically present when a financial fraud occurs and identify a lengthy list of “fraud risk factors.”

Fortune used to rank Enron as the most successful business in the United States. The collapse of Enron was shocked the whole world energy trading market. It caused significant losses to investors. In this paper shows analysis reason of factors that lead to Enron demise and also lessons can be learnt from Enron case study. The approach which have used in this paper to respond, the case study question are the background of the case organization and how business structure had been use by the case organization. Reviewing some lessons that can be learned from this case study to avoid any failure another Enron whether in the financial market, as well as in the auditing and accounting professions.

Second person involved in the scandal was the CFO of the company- Fausto Tonna; he was completely dependent on the internal auditor, without even checking the company books that were handled by the auditor. He also announced a bond issue of 500 million euros, without informing the shareholders, stakeholders and other

After reviewing the financial information of the Tech Tennis, USA, there was a concerned due to some unusual changes in the company’s accounts. Financial statements play a crucial part in the determination of the progress of an organization. It assists the relevant personnel to identify whether the company is making profits or making losses. Although unethical, some companies will tend to deliberately misrepresent some of their financial statement information to create a false impression of the company’s success. There are various techniques that organizations utilize to manipulate their financial statements such as overstating their revenues (Bierstaker, Brody, & Pacini, 2006). In addition, some organization will tend to inflate their sales without considering their cash flow amount that the organization has acquired which will be a red flag to investigate. Consequently, financial statements provide vital information that helps both internal and external users to understand the position of the organization. Some companies in an attempt to continue in the market, they end up manipulating their financial statements that create an illusion of the success of the organization.

Of these transactions, most of it was not in the interest of Enron of Enron’s shareholders; such as profits and cash flows were manipulated and grossly inflated which caused misleading to the investors. AA has also failed to recognise the Generally Accepted Accounting Principle (GAAP) – which is accounting rules used to prepare, present and report financial statements for a wide variety of entities used in United States. AA also did not advise Enron’s audit committee that Enron’s CFO – Andrew Fastow – and his helpers were involved in significant conflict of interests. Enron’s politics and internal control was also found out to be inadequate to protect the shareholders interests. These should have made known and clear as these are responsibilities of an auditor. AA has also make the mistake by which it did not act upon evidence found or neither has it find any audit evidence relating to the numerous share rights transferred to SPEs and the side deals between Enron and banks which remove the banks’ risk from transactions. In auditing, audit documentations are key part to the audit processes.

In October 2001, Enron Corporation which was one of the world major energy, commodities and service companies with claimed revenues of nearly 111 billion dollars during 2000 collapsed under the weight of massive fraud in that it has become largest bankruptcy recognition in the US economy. Enron’s earning report was extremely skewed that losses were not represented in their entirety, prompting more and more wishing to participate in what seemed like a profitable company. After collapse of Enron, Auditor independence has become a social issue that weather auditor has to be independent or not. In addition, while auditing must consider matters objectively with dispassion, there were still doubts whether it implemented well. Further, there has been much speculation about the need for the mandatory rotation of auditors or audit firm rotation to warn false accounting between audit firm and client. By examining Enron case, this essay will discuss about advantages and drawbacks of the mandatory rotation of

There were many red flags in this case that dealt with the timing of payments, changes in profit margins, and rapidly changing inventories and cash flows. The company also pushed the meeting of unrealistic and increasing targets in earnings. If these targets were met, upper management and top executives would receive big bonuses. This created the incentive for upper management to fraudulently record expenses.

Auditors should look out that the company may have the opportunity to carry out the fraud. There have certain conditions that will occur this opportunity

“Audit committee members or their agents may proactively examine areas, functions, and personnel where collusive fraud risk is reasonably likely to be perpetrated,” (Zmags). The search for fraud, even if performed in the same location multiple times, may continue until the audit committee feels confident that they have ruled out the probability that fraud is prevalent. One of the biggest risks of fraud is management override of controls, requiring the extensive search for risk in, “journal entries and other adjustments and reviewing accounting estimates for possible biases that could result in material misstatements,” (Nysscpa).

Enron was once a promising company headed toward greatness but all of this was just for show and thus not long enough; it was discovered that one of the world’s most admired companies was just faking all their records taking down a lot of investors of their company to bankruptcy as well as their employees. The Enron scandal has paved the way not only to America’s consciousness on risks involved on how corporations work, but how stakeholders can be victimized by fraud if corporations are not properly audited and regulated. It also opened consciousness of the whole world as well. In this paper, we will take a look on how proper implementation of business ethics and auditing can help avoid tragedies

Financial statement fraud is something that has become more commonplace than it should be. Many different events will often lead up to a rash of companies participating in financial statement fraud. Between the year 2000 and 2002 there were a number of factors that led to what appeared to be a perfect fraud storm according to our text (Albrecht, Albrecht, Albrecht, & Zimbelman, 2012). Nine of those will be looked at here. It will also be discussed as to what some of the common ways financial statement fraud is concealed while looking at some of the common motivations for such fraud. With this, a look at ways of financial statement fraud exposures can be identified along with who usually will commit this type of fraud.

Lindberg and Beck (2002) claim that auditor independence is hailed as the “cornerstone” in the accounting profession as it is the core reason as to why the public trusts their professional opinion. However, since 2000, many accounting fraud scandals have negatively impacted public opinion on the legitimacy of the audit profession and, if in fact, its independence is uninfluenced by other parties. One of the scandals being the sudden collapse of Enron, given that a few months prior its bankruptcy its auditors Arthur Andersen, which was one of the five largest audit and accounting firms, claimed that Enron was financially healthy, but in fact they were paid off

Financial Statement is the heart and soul of the business industry as it provides the financial condition of the company and the going forward initiatives of the corporation, therefore it is critical that the financial statement is free from manipulation and misstatement to be material and useful for stakeholders and other earning statement users. Goel and Gangolly (2012) implied that top management knows the financial statement users will perceive the audited report as credible, and strategically writes under thorough guidance of corporate lawyers to cautiously position the company’s image positively (p.75). Goel and Gangolly argued that not only the financials metrics, but disclosure statements contain “linguistic cues” for investigation of accurateness and honesty of the writing and presentation style (p.75-76). Financial statement fraud has become a growing problem in the accounting profession and the business industry. According to Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission (COSO, 2010) 1998 to 2007 fraudulent financial reporting statistics, over 60% of the fraud cases were revenue fraud (p.5). Abbasi, Albrecht, Vance and Hansen (2012) emphasized the harmful effect of financial fraud to our economy, specifically to risk-averse investors, which could have crucial long-term consequences to company’s sustainability (p.1293). Abbasi, Albrecht, Vance and Hansen indicated that most companies that were

143). Nearly all individuals and organizations are subject to pressure and rationalization of actions, the risk of fraud is great if internal controls are non-existent or can be overridden. It is vital to look-out for indicators that signal weakness in internal control environment. Opportunities exist for fraud due to role of process owners in the structure of internal control and the ability to avoid or override the existing controls (Golden, Skalak & Clayton, 2006 p. 134). Lack of sound corporate governance functions such as inadequacy in the extent and effectiveness of supervision by independent functions are al signals of fraud as it’s a demonstration of weak control environment. The control environment includes the continuity and effectiveness of internal audit, information technology, and accounting personnel as well as the effectiveness of accounting and reporting systems (Golden, Skalak & Clayton, 2006 p. 134). When such deficiencies are not managed or disciplinary actions put in place to check such weaknesses or override of controls, it may signal potential red

As competition increased and the economy started to plunge in the early 2000s, Enron struggled to maintain their profit margins. Executives determined that in order to keep their debt ratio low, they would need to transfer debt from their balance sheet. “Reducing hard assets while earning increasing paper profits served to increase Enron’s return on assets (ROA) and reduce its debt-to-total-assets ratio, making the company more attractive to credit rating agencies and investors” (Thomas, 2002). Executives developed Structured Financing and Special Purpose Entities (SPE), which they used to transfer the majority of Enron’s debt to the SPEs. Enron also failed to appropriately disclose information regarding the related party transactions in the notes to the financial statements.Andersen performed audit work for Enron and rendered an unqualified opinion of their financial statements while this activity occurred. The seriousness and amount of misstatement has led some to believe that Andersen must have known what was going on inside Enron, but decided to overlook it. Assets and equities were overstated by over $1.2 billion, which can clearly be considered a material amount (Cunningham & Harris, 2006). These are a few of several practices that spiraled out of control in an effort to meet forecasted quarterly earnings. As competition grew against the energy giant and their