Last week in the Overstock.com (NASDAQ:OSTK) earnings conference call, the company’s executives had the following to say about the SEC’s investigation of the company: Patrick Byrne So, is it fair to say that all these other issues that the knuckleheads […]

Case Essential To Protecting Analysts From Issuer Retaliation SCOTTSDALE, Ariz.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Gradient Analytics, Inc. said today that a California state court has ruled that discovery may proceed in the Overstock.com vs. Gradient, et al. litigation. Discovery had been stayed for several […]

It’s official. The Sith Lord and I have concluded our meeting, and public companies in the United States will no longer be required to follow GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles). Instead, they will immediately begin following BOSS (Because Overstock Said […]

Yesterday Sam Antar printed a very interesting piece on his blog that sharply criticized the 2008 first quarter earnings release of Overstock.com (NASDAQ:OSTK). I picked up the most damaging part of it, which related to Overstock claiming a 27% increase […]

My book, Essentials of Corporate Fraud, is currently the number one book in the Auditing category on Amazon.com. It’s been floating between number one and number ten all week long. Amazon updates the statistics hourly, so even one book purchase […]

I am reading Cynthia Cooper’s book, Extraordinary Circumstances, which documents her experiences uncovering the massive fraud at WorldCom. I want to finish reading the book so I can write a proper review here and elsewhere. But I admit I’m having […]

Sam Antar made this nice find in regard to materiality, one of many issues at Overstock.com (NASDAQ:OSTK). You see… materiality is an issue because, in addition to “unusual” material items at Overstock, we’ve seen several immaterial “unusual” items as well. […]

I present for you today one (just one) example of the accounting shenanigans at Overstock.com Inc. (NASDAQ:OSTK) to demonstrate the deception of management. This accounting concept is quite elementary, and it is called EBITDA. EBITDA = Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, […]

A search that brought someone to my blog over the weekend gave me the idea for this post. Immateriality is a concept in accounting that amounts to “too small to matter.” Think of a company with $100 million in sales […]

This one comes from Dennis Howlett’s blog, and to me, it’s hilarious. I’m not sure if you have to be a an auditor or not to think it’s funny. Apparently there are some emails from KPMG associates circulating and here’s […]