• Carnival of Personal Finance #185: Cheesehead Edition

    Welcome to the last Carnival of Personal Finance for 2008, The Cheesehead Edition.  I’m located in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and I send greetings from fellow Cheeseheads. We’ve had an interesting winter so far, with record-level snowfalls in December, followed by record […]

  • A Thief Among Us: Lessons From Bielinski Brothers

    Written by Tracy L. Coenen, CPA, CFF Wisconsin Law Journal During the summer of 2004, a major shakeup was occurring at the Milwaukee-area home building firm of Bielinski Brothers, Inc. Their chief financial officer, Robert Brownell, was fired along with […]

  • Property tax sticker shock

    The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel writes today about the sticker shock property owners are having when they open their property tax bills. The taxes have gone up in general, but property owners are frosted because their assessments no longer match the […]

  • What Has Sarbanes-Oxley Done For You Lately?

    With all the talk about fraud in the last several years, you would think that companies are doing whatever they can to prevent fraud by employees, right? Think again. The number of companies that have radically increased their fraud prevention […]

  • Wondering Why Frauds at Public Companies Aren’t Being Pursued by the Feds?

    Consumers are often left wondering why the Securities and Exchange Commission doesn’t heavily pursue allegations of fraud against public companies like Overstock.com (NASDAQ:OSTK), Usana Health Sciences (NASDAQ:USNA), Herbalife (NYSE:HLF), and the like. I’ve always said the answer is simple: There […]

  • How to make social media a total waste of time

    I admit it: I’m not a lover of all things social media. I am participating in the Facebook and Twitter discussions a bit begrudgingly. It’s not that I don’t think these tools work to grow businesses and create interesting discourse. […]

  • $65 Million Fraud Via a Shell Company Scheme

    The IRS is accusing Ausaf Umar Siddiqui, vice president of Fry’s Electronics Inc., of embezzling more than $65 million from the company via a shell company scheme. They say he used the money to pay gambling debts in Las Vegas […]

  • Red Flags Apparent in Alleged Ponzi Scheme

    Recent news of the alleged $50 billion Ponzi scheme perpetrated by investment advisor Bernard L. Madoff has done nothing to ease the fears of investors who have been annihilated by the stock market over the last couple of months.How does […]

  • For Students and Job Seekers: Becoming a Fraud Investigator

    I routinely get emails from students, job seekers, or the gainfully employed who want to make a career change… all asking me for advice on getting into the field of forensic accounting and fraud investigation. Here are my top three […]

  • Big Three bankruptcy impact distorted

    Last week at the 2008 Inforum Outlook Conference, a presentation was given about the impact of potential bankruptcy filings of the Big Three automakers, GM, Ford, and Chrysler. The media has cited figures ranging from 2 million to 3 million […]