This case analysis will give you the opportunity to review professional liability and accountability issues for managers and accountants. The main objective of this assignment is to analyze how your case illustrates violations to the GAAP, GAAS, and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. The foundation of your arguments must be based on the theories you learned this semester, and your in-depth analysis of how these theories apply to the real world is the most valuable aspect of this assignment. You should focus on answering the question. Refrain from discussing historical or political issues, unless they are directly related to the main topic.
Content:
Your report must include:
a) 1 page – A profile of the company involved. This is a summary of the business and its activities, a line or two about their history, milestones, growth/decline based on sales revenue, net profit margins, gross margins, yearly sales growth rate, income source, working capital, and more (key performance indicators – KIPs). If the company no longer exists, build the profile based on data available for their last year of operations.
b) 4 pages – An analysis of how the company’s practices/methods violated US Law and evaluate the legal and financial consequences to the firm and main parties. Moreover, indicate how these practices could have been prevented.
c) 1 page – Reference page
Total pages: 6. Do not include a cover/title page.
d) List of cases: Pick only one case, and using the library resources and other external sources listed below, research: 1) Waste Management (1998), 2) Enron (2001), 3) American International Group (AIG – 2005), 4) Lehman Brothers (2008), and Bernard Madoff Investment Securities LLC (2008).
Formatting guidelines:
You must cite the book and at least 10 external sources and including all provided in the syllabus using APA style formatting. Every other sentence of your paper should have an APA in-text citation. Use Times New Roman 12, double-spaced.
External sources:
Do not cite Wikipedia or Investopedia! Other reliable sources are national newspapers, official government websites, and business magazines such as Inc.com, fastcompany.com, Harvard Business Review hbr.org, and The Economist. To be successful, make sure you address all the issues described above.