For decades Dell was the market's darling. Since Michael Dell founded the company in his University of Texas dorm room in 1984, the company was loved by investors, analysts and business...

The mid-term elections turned Barney Frank into the most important and powerful legislators in the US. As chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, his views carry some weight.His...

The trial only started last week but punters are already placing bets on the fate of former newspaper magnate Conrad Black. The online gaming site BetUS.com is placing odds on what verdict Black will...

On the past, I've written about delinquent communities where people have aided and abetting financial fraud. Auditors have helped cook the books, lawyers have provided advice on how to get around...

The number of companies now implicated in the growing backdating scandal has hit 257, according to a report from Glass Lewis. That's more than double the number we've been reading about.You...

Siemens' woes have gone from bad to worse with the arrest of board member Johannes Feldmayer, once regarded as the big contender for the top job there. The arrest of the man who would be CEO was...

Earlier this month, Saving Animals Across Borders came out with the announcement that it was flogging the desks of Enron chairman, the late Ken Lay, its chief executive Jeff Skilling (now doing 24...

How much crude oil is Iraq actually exporting?That's anyone's guess because four years into the US occupation, the contractors in charge of calibrating, fixing and replacing the meters on oil...

First day in court for the Australian regulator's lawsuit against Citigroup alleging conflicts of interest and insider trading.The case has attracted investment banks around the world worried....

Late last year I did an entry looking at whether Sarbanes-Oxley was becoming the global standard with regulators around the world putting in similar, albeit not identical, regimes that echo the US...

Last year I did a blog entry looking at the limitations of Sarbanes-Oxley when it comes to clawing back cash bonuses and stock awards from executives whose fraud or misdeeds had resulted in a...

Here's the conundrum about backdating. Everyone knows it's cheating shareholders. That's why it's been compared to betting on yesterday's horse races.But unlike other types of...

Is SOX unconstitutional?That's been the question raised by the Free Enterprise Fund. Last year it launched a constitutional challenge, led by Kenneth Starr of Whitewater and Monica Lewinsky fame,...

Some interesting new figures following the decision of the three-judge panel with the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals to block the $40 billion investor class action against Enron.The data...

Auditors are supposed to watch out for the red flags when they combing through a company's books. Put simply, if you have a number of these flags, the auditor should start having serious doubts...

Even by US standards, this piece of litigation is truly bizarre.Last week, all the attention was on reports that Viacom, Nickelodeon's parent company, had launched a $1 billion copyright...

Early this year, I warned that there were signs that gangs spreading malware were getting smarter.The underground economy of data theft and leakage is booming and the perpetrators are one step of...

Siemens has been forced to put more money into its joint venture with Nokia because of delays linked to bribery investigations and to cover any future damages claims, reports Forbes.This is very much...

Eleven years ago, Bill Clinton came out with the extraordinarily deceptive statement that "the era of big government is over".It was complete garbage then and his Republican successor went...