The Securities and Exchange Commission charged three former top officers of New Century Financial Corporation with securities fraud for misleading investors as New Century’s subprime mortgage business was collapsing in 2006. At the time of the fraud, New Century was one of the largest subprime lenders in the nation. In its complaint, the SEC alleges [...]
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How Fraudsters Try to Look Legitimate
The SEC is putting its new investor-focused website to good use: Investor.gov. The first item that caught my eye was their article on how fraudsters use fake SEC registrations and bogus seals to make them look legitimate: Fake Seals and Phony Numbers: How Fraudsters Try to Look Legit. They offer these five pieces of advice: [...]
It’s Tough Being Green… And Charged With Fraud
Mantria Corporation is a “diversified and progressive business enterprise that seeks out emerging sectors with a passionate focus on sustainability and the commercialization of socially responsible products and services.” At least that’s what their website says. The SEC says: “In reality, the only green these promoters seemed interested in was investors’ money.” According to the [...]
The SEC is Going After the Geeks
First, Bernie the boss turned himself in, saying he did it all by himself. Nobody believed that, including the SEC. So the SEC went after Madoff’s right-hand man, DiPascali, and Madoff’s accountant, Friehling. Now the SEC is going after the geeks. The Securities and Exchange Commission charged two computer programmers for their role in helping [...]
The Dark Side of Aggressive Goal Setting in the Workplace: A Shortcut to Unethical Behavior
EthicsPoint sponsored a webinar by Dr. Lisa Ordóñez, University of Arizona, Professor of Management and Organizations in the Eller College of Management at The University of Arizona “Applied managerial experience and hundreds of academic research studies have catalogued the positive impacts of goal setting on performance. Challenging, specific goals compared to instructions to “do your [...]
International Fraud Awareness Week
November 8-14, 2009 is International Fraud Awareness Week. This weeklong campaign, sponsored by the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, encourages business leaders and employees to proactively take steps to minimize the impact of fraud by promoting anti-fraud awareness and education. Test your knowledge about fraud with this Fraud IQ Test, which includes 20 actual questions [...]
How Did Madoff Go Bad?
Last Friday, the SEC published the exhibits for Investigation of Failure of the SEC to Uncover Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi Scheme (Report No. OIG-509). That was 536 separate exhibits tying to fill in the background on what happened with the SEC and Madoff. The one that caught my eye was exhibit 104 that summarized a June [...]
SEC’s Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations Gets a Review
The SEC’s Division of Enforcement was not alone in getting a report from the SEC’s Inspector General: Improvements Needed Within the SEC’s Division of Enforcement. The Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations also got a review from the Inspector General: Review and Analysis of OCIE Examinations of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, LLC. For this [...]
Improvements Needed Within the SEC’s Division of Enforcement
The SEC’s Inspector General, H. David Kotz, released his most recent report: Program Improvements Needed Within the SEC’s Division of Enforcement. The report is sort of a follow-up to the Madoff Report. The Office of the Inspector General conducted a review “to identify systemic issues that would prevent Enforcement from accomplishing its mission to enforce [...]
KPMG Fraud Survey 2009
KPMG Forensic has released their Fraud Survey 2009. The survey shows that many managers remain concerned about fraud. There are plenty of investigations of fraud that may have helped fuel the financial markets meltdown. Record levels of government spending may usher in record levels of fraud, waste, and abuse. In these difficult economic times, managers [...]
