Phar-Mor Case

The main objective of the Sarbanes-Oxley act was to reduce fraud. So far that objective seem to have been obtain. Since SOX was enacted, there has not been a major domestic corporate financial scandal uncovered other than the options back-dating scandal that occurred before July 2002 (Jahmani & Dowling, 2008). It is a tax advantage because companies and investors are not losing money.

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 was implemented and designed to “protect the interests of the investing public” and the “mission is to set and enforce practice standards for a new class of firms registered to audit publicly held companies” (Verschoor, 2012). During the early 2000 's, the world saw an alarming number of accounting scandals take place resulting in many corporations going bankrupt. Some of the major companies involved in these scandals were from Enron, WorldCom, and one of the top five accounting and auditing firms, Arthur Andersen. These companies were dishonest with their financial statements, assuring the public the company was very successful, when in reality they were not. This became a problem because if the public believes a company is doing well, they are more likely to invest in it. That is to say, once these companies were exposed, it caused a number of companies going bankrupt and a major mistrust between the public and the capital market. Consequently, the federal government quickly took action and enacted the Sarbanes-Oxley act of 2002, also known as SOX, which was created by the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB), and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Many have questioned what Norman Bowie (2004) had questioned,

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) was passed by U.S congress in 2002 to protect investors from fraudulent accounting activities by corporations. Whether the organization is big or small, the act mandates strict reforms to improve financial disclosures from corporations, helping to prevent accounting fraud. It is a federal law that established new and expanded requirements for all U.S. public company boards, management, public accounting firm's, as well as privately held companies. SOX requires top management individually certify the accuracy of financial information, and includes penalties for fraudulent financial activity. The bill was enacted in response to a large number of major corporate and accounting scandals the cost of investors

I believe the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 has been effective in managing the risks exposed through previous corporate fraudulent financial reporting scandals. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act makes fraudulent financial reporting a crime in which strong penalties can be enforced (Ferrell & Ferrell, 2013). This act also protects investors as corporations are required to be transparent with their finances as well as to create a code of ethics in which they are to abide. The purpose of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, also known as SOX, is to make top executives responsible for the information that appears on the company’s financial documents. With the implementation of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act executives are required to know what is on financial statements and to

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) was passed by Congress in 2002, and is administered by the SEC. The SEC checks for compliance and creates rules and requirements. The Act was created to restore investor confidence in financial statements after major accounting frauds, such as Enron, Tyco, and WorldCom. In addition, SOX aimed to prevent future accounting fraud through improving the accuracy of disclosures and through increasing corporate governance, accountability, and reliability.

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 was passed by congress in 2002 and has been instrumental in protecting investor from fraud. The Act was passed to respond to the accounting malpractices of many corporations such as ENRON, who conducted many deceiving practices. It Is also known as the SOX Act and it required strict reform to improve financial disclosures from corporation to prevent fraud. This has been instrumental and has brought a higher level of accountability to companies.

The Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) Act of 2002 was legislated by Congress to restore reliability of financial statements with the objectives to raise standards of corporate accountability, to not only improve detection, but to also prevent fraud and abuse (Terando & Kurtenbach, 2009). Additionally, SOX was the response to general failure of business ethics such as the propagation of abusive tax shelters and greater aggressive tax avoidance strategies (Raabe, Whittenburg, Sanders, & Sawyers, 2015).

US government in July 2002 passed the Sarbanes Oxley Act of 2002 shortly known as SOX. The act was named on Senator Paul Sarbanes and Representative Michael Oxley who was its main contributor. The act came after when a series of scandal such as Enron, WorldCom, Tyco, Global Crossing and Arthur Andersen came into the light, which resulted in the loss of investors’ money and confidence. Therefore, the main objective of SOX was to protect the interest of shareholders and general public from accounting errors and fraudulent practices done by corporations.

In the case of Phar-Mor fraud, the company was involved in cover up and some accounts were created to hide the fraudulent activities. Bad inventory counts in the stores were made to help with the cover up and deceit about activities that cost hundreds of millions of dollars. (Williams, S.L., 2011)

After the quick demise of Enron, governing and regulating businesses had to modify so that such an event like this would never happen again. Once Enron was exposed, a new federal law came into place known as the Sarbanes Oxley Act (SOX) . This law aims to public accounting firms that participate in audits for other corporations to ensure corporations are following accurate accounting practices and reliability of appropriate disclosures. SOX also strengthens corporate governance rules, requirements needed to report to shareholders, strengthening whistleblowers, increasing penalties for any dishonesty and holding executives accountable.

The events of fraudulent and misstatement of financial data over the past decade or so have triggered an epidemic of financial concerns within the accounting community. These scandals have created a lot of economic turmoil, not only in the United States (U.S.), but also in other developed countries around the world. Since these events have arose, several agencies have been seeking various ways to help reduce future events of unethical behavior from continuing. After the WorldCom and Enron scandals at the turn of the century, the Sarbanes – Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) was implemented in an attempt to mitigate the guidelines of financial reporting in the U.S. and entities operating abroad. Section

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act also helped managers see that their companies had many weaknesses, such as “lack of enforcement of existing policies, unnecessary complexity, clogged communications, and a feeble compliance culture” (2006), per the Harvard Business Review. Managers and executives could recognize their company’s weaknesses because SOX requires publicly traded companies to be standardized. Section 302 explains the corporate responsibility behind the financial reports, such as how the CEO and CFO must be involved in the auditing process and how they must report any fraud that they see in the reports. This section forced managers to overlook their internal audits and therefore helped them to see what needed to be done to improve the financial

In the early 1990's, Waste Management, instead of just picking up the garbage, provided garbage to their investors in the form of an accounting scandal which cost investors approximately $6 billion (Bloomberg News) and was described by Thomas C. Newkirk, associate director of the SEC's Division of Enforcement as "one of the most egregious accounting frauds we have seen" (SEC). What Mr. Newkirk is

At the time the fraud existed, internal controls were almost non-existent. The management team employed a number of improper accounting practices that did not comply with GAAP. As stated earlier, CEO Dean Buntrock not only allowed internal controls to be bypassed, he encouraged them to be ignored and shaped accounting policy with the sole purpose of making the targeted earnings numbers every year. The auditing firm, Arthur Andersen, LLP, was also shown to have complicity. The partners at Andersen knew that the company’s policies were not compliant so they provided Waste Management with proposed adjusting entries to their books. Waste Management refused to make the adjustments so Andersen had Waste Management sign off on a list of 32 steps the company must do to change its practices. The document legally constituted an agreement among the two parties and clearly shows that Andersen was aware of fraud that Waste Management had covered up in the past. Furthermore, Andersen did not stand up to the company and continued to

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) was enacted into law in 2002 in the wake of corporation financial reporting scandals involving large publicly held companies. SOX instituted new strict financial regulations with the intent of improving accounting practices and protecting investors from corporate misconduct. SOX requires corporate executives to vouch for the accuracy of financial statements, and to institute and monitor effective internal controls over financial reporting. The cost of implementing an effective internal control structure are onerous, and SOX inflicts opportunity costs upon an enterprise as executives have