Fraud Clues in the Notes to Financial Statements

The notes to financial statements are often lengthy and boring. But they can provide very important information about a company.  On the most basic level, they provide details behind the company’s numbers. But they can also provide clues to fraud or other irregularities that may be occurring. Tracy gives a …

Financial Statement Fraud: Overstatement of Revenue

By far the most common way that executives manipulate financial statements is through the overstatement of revenue. The reason is simple: It’s the easiest way to improve the appearance of the company’s financial condition. Revenue can be inflated by doing things such as: Booking fictitious sales Holding the books open …

Preventing Fraud in a Small Business

Cost-saving measures are always attractive to businesses. If a company with annual revenue of $10 million could eliminate a $500,000 expense, would management be interested? Internal fraud prevention could be the key to saving money in precisely this way. Experts estimate that companies lose about 5% of their revenue each …