http://www.forbes.com/sites/richardbehar/2014/12/31/the-madoff-five-historys-greatest-fraud-yields-one-of-the-greatest-legal-slugfests-of-our-time/print/

Richard BeharContributor

BUSINESS 12/31/2014 @ 11:48PM 21,561 views

Madoff’s Little Helpers: An Epic Trial, Puzzling Sentences

At first blush, they seem like ordinary people who simply had the misfortune to work for a man responsible for the greatest fraud ever. But in a complex trial, prosecutors convinced jurors that these five were the ones who made the Ponzi scheme work, winning guilty verdicts on all 59 counts.

THE MADOFF FIVE: History’s Greatest Fraud Yields One Of The Greatest Legal Slugfests Of Our Time

“What?! For Annette? How the hell did that happen?! Oh my God, I can’t believe Annette got only six years. Don’t tell me it’s gonna be like two months for [co-defendants] Jerry and George. That pisses me off, I’m sorry. I thought she was more guilty than all of them. The prosecutors must have been devastated. It’s kind of like a slap in the face to everybody who worked so hard getting these guys convicted, and for the jury who had to listen to the evidence for nearly six months.”

— Juror Sheila Amato, on sentence imposed on Annette Bongiorno, a former top manager at Madoff Securities

“Richard, these five loyal and dedicated employees were following the instructions of their immediate supervisor. They were not SEC-registered brokers and therefore had no reason to believe that they were violating any SEC regulations. They were always led to believe that the trades and the client assets were effected and held in Europe, as was common in our industry for this type of transaction. I alone am responsible for any wrongdoing on their part and will always suffer for the pain I caused my clients, my employees and their families.”

— Bernard L. Madoff, to author Continue reading →

http://www.scmp.com/print/comment/insight-opinion/article/1673481/securities-and-futures-commission-has-spun-out-control

Securities and Futures Commission has spun out of control

Sunday, 04 January, 2015, 6:53am

Jake van der Kamp

A markets tribunal has overturned a request by Moody’s Investors Services for privacy in its appeal against a Securities and Futures Commission’s decision to fine the ratings agency HK$23 million.

SCMP Business, January 2

I just don’t understand these people at Moody’s. Here they were four years ago still facing awkward questions about whether they foresaw the 2008 financial crisis or were any better than the market itself in rating risk and they decided to come up with a new ratings tool.

They called it the “Red Flags” framework, a way of assessing fixed income risk in emerging markets. Red flags would be posted according to set rules for five critical areas in which corporate affairs could go wrong. Count the number of flags and you get a workable debt rating. Continue reading →

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/11304016/Directors-are-still-not-properly-policing-corporate-dangers.html

Directors are still not properly policing corporate dangers, study finds

Study of audit committees shows slow progress on monitoring accounts and risks

Tesco’s accounting issues have highlighted the role of directors in spotting problems Photo: Bloomberg News

By Marion Dakers, Financial Services Editor

8:15PM GMT 03 Jan 2015

Many company directors have struggled to get to grips with new rules that are supposed to help identify risks that firms could face, though some progress is being made, according to new research.

Despite high-profile examples of boards missing dangers, including accounting holes at the Co-operative and Tesco in the past two years, some companies’ audit committees are still producing “disappointingly sparse and generic” reports, the accounting firm BDO said. Continue reading →

http://www.forbes.com/sites/johnwasik/2015/01/02/zombie-stocks-why-you-need-to-avoid-dormant-shell-companies/print/

John WasikContributor

PERSONAL FINANCE 1/02/2015 @ 9:32AM 327 views

Zombie Stocks: Why You Need to Avoid Dormant Shell Companies

Imagine companies that are pretty much left for dead, only to be revived by toxic waste handlers called penny stock promoters. These “dormant shell” companies are corporations in name only. Even though they don’t have any viable business operations, they continue to trade. Here’s how these companies are seemingly brought back to life:

A promoter hawks them to investors, thus pumping up the stock price, then dumps them without telling their customers, who get creamed. It’s a classic “pump and dump” scheme. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and FINRA, the securities industry self-regulator recently warned about these zombie entities. Continue reading →

http://blogs.wsj.com/cfo/2015/01/02/study-going-concern-letters-on-decline-but-that-may-not-be-good/?mod=WSJ_hpp_sections_cfo

January 2, 2015, 9:12 AM ET

Study: ‘Going Concern’ Letters on Decline, But That May Not Be Good

JOHN KESTER

Reporter

Warnings to struggling companies are decreasing, but dead companies can’t be audited.

That’s part of the message from a new Going Concern Report by Audit Analytics. Fewer companies in the 2013 fiscal year saw red flags raised over their ability to continue as a going concern than did during the 2012 fiscal year. But that’s partly because many businesses closed up shop.

Audit Analytics estimates that 2,384 companies received “going concern” warnings for the 2013 fiscal year. That’s nearly a  6% drop from 2012. However, 207 companies that received such warnings in 2012 filed terminations and no longer exist.

“That’s not a good thing…you figure there’s some kind of economic pressure on companies,” said Donald Whalen, director of research at Audit Analytics. “You get a mixed bag if you just simply look at the number of going concern [warnings].” Continue reading →

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2015/01/488_170985.html

Updated : 2015-01-02 18:38

Warning issued against L/C fraud

By Kim Jae-won

The Financial Supervisory Service (FSC) said Friday that it warned banks against hoax letters of credit (L/C), purportedly issued in the name of some foreign lenders. “We sent a letter to local lenders and branches of foreign banks to strengthen their process in managing letters of credit,” said an official at the FSC. Woori Bank and several other local banks recently discovered false letters of credit allegedly issued by foreign banks, officials said. Continue reading →

http://www.scmp.com/print/business/banking-finance/article/1672837/moodys-denied-privacy-appeal-against-sfc

Moody’s denied privacy in appeal against SFC

Friday, 02 January, 2015, 3:50am

Enoch Yiu enoch.yiu@scmp.com

Markets tribunal overturns ratings agency’s request for privacy in appeal against a fine imposed for issuing a ‘red flags’ report

A markets tribunal has overturned a request by Moody’s Investors Service for privacy in its appeal against the Securities and Futures Commission’s decision to fine the ratings agency HK$23 million.

The commission had fined Moody’s HK$23 million and publicly reprimanded the agency for breaching the code of conduct by issuing a “red flags” report on Chinese companies in July 2011. Continue reading →