Globally, the 45 per cent of companies reporting fraud now is up 8 percentage points on two years ago, according to the PricewaterhouseCoopers Global Economic Crime Survey for 2005. Here's the scary part: despite tougher corporate governance and disclosure requirements, better computer systems and greater awareness post-Enron, most frauds (34 percent) are detected by chance through for example tip-offs. It's a worry that it happens in one-third of cases.

There's been a 71 percent increase in reports of bribery and corruption, a 133 per cent jump in money laundering reports and the number reporting financial shenanigans is up a whopping 140 percent.

Still, fraud by definition is about deception which means it has to be difficult, if not impossible, to detect. Standard & Poor's offers a check list of seven red flags to look out for when you are watching out for bad companies and corporate meltdowns. Not all of them go bad because of fraud. Still, bad company whether by fraud or otherwise is what you get when the forces of corporate pathology go unchecked.