The Enron bankruptcy has generated that tens of thousands of people lost all or a large part of their life savings, all because of poor financial management by the officials of that organization, such as the ex-presidents of the board and the ex- General Manager Messrs Lay and Skilling, who were warned in advance by some qualified employees of the disaster that might ensue.
Well, in order to fill their equity coffers, with financial maneuvers they continued to receive their enormous salaries, and even greater bonuses and to exercise their options to purchase shares at preferential prices, thus deceiving investors, investment advisers, SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) which is an organization representing publicly listed companies, and their own employees, many of whom lost all their savings that they had invested in the company.
Messrs. Jeffrey Skilling and Kenneth Lay are currently on trial on conspiracy, embezzlement and securities fraud related to the presentation of the financial statements, when the company overestimated its benefits, underestimated its debts and signed a wide range of agreements that violated current accounting rules.
The accused officials use their defenses like any criminal or criminal using the terms of "I did not go", "it was the other", "it was the external, external and exogenous circumstances over which we had no control", "there was a plot", "It was the media that created the panic," among other baseless excuses trying to state that they are innocent.
According to attorneys and defendants, they said their clients were not paying their debts to the company and that the company is unfairly slandered for fraud, after several officials pleaded guilty in order to assist the justice system so that their sentences would be reduced in return. to cooperate with the investigation.
We have Mr. Richard Causey, former chief accountant, who was responsible for Enron's bankruptcy, who was an important figure in the great financial scandal that led to Enron bankruptcy in December 2001, since the company had used deals with related companies, outside from its accounting, to hide debt and inflate results and, on the other hand, to ex - financial director Mr. Andrew Fastow; That their testimony of them can be a major obstacle to the defense and an advantage to the accusation of the ex - officials.
Worldcom
It presents the case of fraud in the financial statements, during the year 2001 and the first quarter of 2002, the company recorded as capital investments including line costs which are the fees that Wolrdcom pays to other companies in the telecommunications business, for access to their communication networks.
These costs originate every day and are paid monthly according to the contracts established between the different companies, affecting the profit for the period, because instead of directly affecting, it is amortized over several years.
The company greatly affected investors and creditors by showing figures that do not correspond, because it directly affects the cash flow from operations, because it showed a higher profit, although the cash flow was actually decreased because these expenses were paid to the companies that provided their services.
Parmalat
Parmalat fraudulently offered guaranteed senior notes to US investors, significantly overestimating the company's assets and also significantly underestimating the company's liabilities.
Parmalat deceived the North American investors informing that they would use their cash balances, that they represented a surplus which in reality did not exist to repurchase the corporation's debt and that finally it did not, leaving that debt in force and failing in the promissory notes offered by the company.
I forged bank documents to make investors believe that I had cash and marketable securities in an account of Bank of America in the name of Financing Corporation (Bonlat), a subsidiary owned by Parmalat, then it had been confirmed in this regard that the account did not existed in the bank.
These nonexistent assets were shown in Bonlat's books and records for 2002 and in turn in Parmalat's consolidated financial statements for 2002 until June 30, 2003, where Parmalat offered its notes to North American investors, where the documents delivered contained many significant false information about the financial condition of the company.
The company's balance sheet showed a large cash balance, but it's not really there. The debt was very low, but it was actually much higher than the balance showed.
We also know the cases that occurred with Merck, Nortel, Global Croossing, AIG, Ahold, Waste Managment, Tyco, Xerox, AOL and the latest ones investigated for fraud and financial scandals are Liverdoor of Japan, Volkswagen, DaimlerChrysler, commerzbank, Infineon, BMW, Cendant, Ikea, Boing and the Repsol - YPF branch in Spain that has been denounced by the Bolivian government.
There are many companies in North America that enter into out-of-court settlements to settle the scandals and thus avoid ending up in lawsuits, the costs and consequences of which are unpredictable. It is a practice allowed by US laws called "deferred proceeding", where many companies are covered by this law as we have Computer Associates, Bristol Myers Squibb or Time Warner.
In Peru, financial mismanagement from the state has been seen, such as the case of the Fujimori government and its collaborator Montesinos, who are now detained by the justice system for having misused economic resources, in order to fill their wealth coffers. or personal.
We also have many NGOs that are being questioned for the mismanagement of financial resources, since these institutions received donated funds from abroad to do social work for the well-being of the community, but which in turn do not meet their objectives established in the project that they presented to international agencies for said donation or financing.
Due to these accounting scandals that have occurred in the business world, the standardization of norms and laws has been accelerating, not only of a criminal nature to protect business, but also commercial and information laws, these events put into effect the homologation of International Auditing Standards. (ISA), International Accounting Standards (IAS) and International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS); additionally we find laws like the "USA Patriot", "Victory Act" and "Sarbanes -Oxley".
For the aforementioned cases, we need highly trained auditors and accountants not only in the field of the accounting and financial profession, but also in the legal and legal field, due to the need for their investigations to be global and not just local; Because these investigations will serve as evidence before the court and the assessment of their testimonies that must be supported with documents that demonstrate the events that occurred within the organization and its environment.
This professional is called a Forensic Auditor, who must have a very complete training on the different criminal modalities, with an emphasis on economic and financial crimes.
Also have a knowledge of the operational part of the different investigation processes and be very careful not to make mistakes that could damage the evidences of the investigations.
So that this does not happen in organizations, the control agencies must supervise and audit with criteria and honesty, enforcing the accounting standards in force, because the resources generated by the company must be well managed in order to promote sustainable and responsible development. of companies and the country.
We need honest and responsible professionals such as executives, managers, accountants, administrators and others; that she must act with honesty, probity and be upright in the development of her work, demonstrating transparency in the management of economic resources, thus promoting the economic, social and financial advancement of the company.
Accountants must be an agent of change, who can facilitate the tasks of paying taxes, develop new ways to analyze accounting information more simply and accurately and, in general, improve and increase the vision of their profession, since as Future workers, it is in him to make a change that really contributes to the development of our country and to fight so that the accounting serves as an instrument of control and serves the national interests and for the sustainable social, economic development of the peoples.
