Nearly five years after the most stringent anti-fraud and corporate governance measures were introduced in the US, and fraud is still strong.

According to a new study from the Deloitte Forensic Center, found that "accounting and auditing enforcement releases," or AAERs, dealing with financial-statement analysis fraud actually peaked in 2003 at 77. Indeed, back in 2004, AAERS were describing a fraud scheme for every working day of the year. Then, it fell back. But check the numbers in the Deloitte report. The SEC is now issuing an average of 50 AAERs each year, way more than what it was doing five year ago. Clearly, something is not working. As the Deloitte report says:

"Despite increasingly stringent legislation such as the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act aimed at combating fraud - and despite increased enforcement efforts by the SEC - financial statement fraud remains a public concern."

The report classified 12 types of fraud, and 57 sub-categories. These are aiding & abetting; manipulation of A/R; asset misappropriation; manipulation of assets; bribery & kickbacks; manipulation of expenses; goodwill; manipulation of liabilities; improper disclosures; manipulation of reserves; investments and revenue.

So what are the most common types of fraud. According to Deloitte, the big one is revenue recognition, the most lethal to investors. That can be done all sorts of ways: recording revenue too soon, inflating the actual amount of revenue or simply fabricating a revenue generating transaction. Revenue recognition makes up 41 per cent of all frauds.

Most companies (82 per cent) had from one to five fraud schemes, but over 20 had 10 or more and some had as many as 20 on the go.