The contemporary generation lives in a modern globalized world that comes through the economic recession last few years. Just this recession often forces management of the companies to modify achieved financial results to meet the expectations of the owners. External auditors provides to the owners level of confidence, that the submitted financial statements respect the principle of truth and fair view of accounting and that the owners can rely on the financial information. The main objective of this thesis is to explain the role of the external audit and audit procedures performed. It contains theoretical and practical part. The attention is focused on the 4th stage of the audit -- substantive and control testing. The paper also contains practical advises for users of financial statements. I also tried to clarify the concept of creative accounting practice and its basic methods.

Whereas the problem of fraud is a global one, the rate and extent to which it is perpetrated in Nigeria, particularly in the public sector, is quite high and alarming. Literature reveals that different fraud prevention and detection mechanisms are being adopted to combat the menace of fraud; forensic accounting techniques appears to be the most effective and are currently used in most developed countries of the world. However, the extent to which forensic accounting techniques are being applied in fraud prevention and detection in Nigeria is not known. Also, the intention to use forensic accounting services in the public service has not been investigated. This study was therefore aimed at examining the application of forensic accounting techniques in fraud prevention and detection in Nigeria. Specific objectives were: (1) to investigate the mechanisms of fraud prevention and detection, and their levels of effectiveness in Nigeria, (2) to identify the major factors that hinder the application of forensic accounting techniques in fraud prevention and detection in Nigeria, (3) to examine practitioners' opinions and behavioural intention to use forensic accounting techniques in fraud prevention and investigation in Nigeria, (4) to explore the level of awareness of forensic accounting techniques in Nigeria and (5) to examine the readiness of universities in taking up forensic accounting courses. The study involved the collection of quantitative data. These data were collected from three sets of populations, viz. accounting students, accounting academics and accounting practitioners. The questionnaire served as the survey instruments. The data collected were analysed using appropriate statistical techniques and computer software. The study identified several fraud prevention and detection mechanisms that are currently used in Nigeria, such as systems of internal controls, operational audits and corporate code of conduct. Students' t-test indicates a significant difference between the perceived effectiveness and actual usage of fraud prevention and detection mechanisms in Nigeria. It was further discovered that the most effective mechanisms, like the forensic accounting techniques, are the least used in fraud prevention and detection. This implies that the current mechanisms of fraud prevention and detection are not proactive in dealing with the fraud menace. Also, legal, educational and political factors were identified to hinder the application of forensic accounting techniques in Nigeria. The level of awareness in forensic accounting in Nigeria is generally low. While the one-way analysis of variance indicates a significant variation among the three populations, it was discovered that students had the lowest level of awareness. Further findings of the study reveal that the universities are not yet ready to take up forensic accounting courses. Using the structural equation modelling (SEM), all the other seven propositions were supported. The findings of this study have both theoretical and practical implications. Theoretically, it further strengthened the findings of previous studies on the organisational intention. From the practical point of view, there is urgent need for manpower development in universities with specialisation in forensic accounting. Again, the educational institutions, and particularly the universities in Nigeria, would need to include forensic accounting courses in the undergraduate curriculum as education has been shown to be pivotal in creating awareness on the use of forensic accounting techniques. Furthermore, from the sampled space, the study has captured the current state of forensic accounting in Nigeria and the findings will be very useful for the public service, private organisations and policy makers.

In 1995 Congress passed the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act to address several perceived abuses in securities fraud class actions. In the aftermath of Enron, WorldCom, and other high profile securities litigation, critics suggest that the law made it easier for firms to escape securities fraud liability and thus created a climate conducive to fraud. Proponents maintain that the PSLRA has deterred the filing of nonmeritorious cases. This article explores whether the PSLRA achieved Congress's twin goals of "curb[ing] frivolous, lawyer-driven litigation, while preserving investors' ability to recover meritorious claims." The empirical evidence suggests that, in many respects, the PSLRA did achieve several of Congress' goals. There has been a reduction in the number of securities class actions filed. The PSLRA has improved overall case quality, particularly in the circuit with most stringent interpretation of the heightened pleading standard. In general, Congress seems to have achieved its goal of reducing the race to the court by increasing the filing delay in securities class actions. However, a stricter interpretation of the pleading standard does not affect this. The PSLRA does little to reduce the incidence of litigation for high technology issuers, but the evidence suggests that the litigation risk has substantially decreased for these issuers. Overall, the monitoring of attorney's effort increased, but institutional investors are no better at monitoring than other lead plaintiffs. The findings also suggest that lead plaintiffs forcing plaintiff's attorneys to compete for designation as lead counsel has resulted in lower attorney's fees. The observed effect is greater when the lead plaintiff is an institutional investor.

This thesis focuses on the problems of the accounting fraud published in media. The first chapter describes the basic concepts of economic crime and its statistical development in the Czech Republic. The second and third chapters define the types of fraudulent action and its used methods on the theoretical basis. The fourth part creates a practical analysis of the accounting fraud. There is used the monitoring of media reports, which serve as a view of accounting manipulations.

This dissertation deals with methods of creative accounting linked with an auditor risk. In the theory part, there is creative accounting defined together with its methods and demonstrations. The auditor risk is then defined as the risk of an inappropriate statement to final accounts issued by the auditor. It refers to the auditor's respond to a possible risk with the aim to reveal the important (material) inaccuracy in the accounting accounts. The practical part demonstrates the possibility of the important (material) inaccuracy made either intentionally or with neglect. The aim of the work is to demonstrate the potential occurance of the practices of the creative accounting in the final accounts and the auditor's possible response to this situation. The conclusion of this dissertation deals with the possible auditor's statements linked with the revealed important (material) inaccuracies in final accounts.

The diploma thesis deals with the issue of creative accounting and subsequent manipulation of financial statements. This is the current topic in our country and in the world. After several world scandals in the area of deliberate misrepresentation of accounting, an increasing emphasis is placed on the reporting ability of financial statements and, in particular, their true and fair value. Financial statements are often the basis for making economic decisions by external users of financial statements. Therefore, it is necessary to emphasize other possible methods leading to the detection of the misstatements in them. The diploma thesis is divided into literary and practical part. In the literary part the reader is acquainted with basic concepts, definition of creative accounting and accounting fraud. There is also a set of selected identification methods used both to prevent the creation and to detect accounting frauds. The practical part of the thesis applies four selected models to the financial statements of the selected entity. It is a small entity without an audit obligation where the main activity is the provision of IT services. Applied and further compared are the Beneish M-Score, Jones Nondiscretionary accruals, CFEBT and Piotroski F-Score models. An add-on is a bankrupt Altman model that evaluates the financial health of the entity, but it does not indicate anything about the possibility of disturbing the true and fair value. Risk periods are analyzed in detail using basic financial analysis techniques. The conclusion of the thesis provides an evaluation of the applicability and suitability of the used methods for the given type of business.

LL.M. (Banking Law) / When a bank employee commits fraudulent acts within the course and scope of his employment, he renders the bank vicariously liable for his fraud. The logical conundrum is that since a bank never employs someone to commit fraud, and since fraud is thus never in this sense within the course and scope of his employment, should the bank never be liable for this fraudulent conduct? If this were the law, the public could potentially be defrauded with impunity, because those defrauded would be left only with a claim against a fraudster who likely has no assets. This dissertation examines the common-law doctrine of vicarious liability and illustrates the sometimes-haphazard manner in which courts have applied the underlying principle to the varying facts that arise. It will be shown that the application of the doctrine to cases involving fraud by bank employees is particularly inconsistent and unsatisfactory. It will be proposed that the solution lies in the development of the common law so as to promote the spirit, purport and objects of the Bill of Rights, and particularly section 25 of the Constitution. 2 This paragraph conceptualises the vicarious liability doctrine. Paragraph 2 considers the application of the doctrine by the courts, and points to inconsistencies in approach. The third paragraph deals briefly with the position in two common-law jurisdictions, Canada and Britain. The final paragraph proposes a solution to the observed inconsistencies: an employee acts in the course and scope of his employment for purposes of imposing vicarious liability when the employer’s right not to be arbitrarily deprived of his property in terms of section 25 of the Constitution is acknowledged, and his vicarious liability is limited to cases where there is a rational relationship between the employee’s fraudulent conduct and the scope of his employment, and not an arbitrary deprivation. In considering the South African cases, it readily becomes apparent that the courts have already instinctively adopted the approach of examining the nature and extent of the deviation by the employee from the scope of his employment, but have not done so in the context of the property clause ...

Submitted by Elba Lopes (elba.lopes@fecap.br) on 2017-04-03T23:58:55Z No. of bitstreams: 2 Juliana_Cristina_Milan.pdf: 2666498 bytes, checksum: 489e19e6f6b77014d08dd347bc4e4aa2 (MD5) license_rdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-04-03T23:58:55Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 Juliana_Cristina_Milan.pdf: 2666498 bytes, checksum: 489e19e6f6b77014d08dd347bc4e4aa2 (MD5) license_rdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-08-29 / Corporate fraud and other harmful practices might find support in accounting. For managers and preparers of financial statements the presence of rules that allow discretion in the choice of practices for recognition and measurement could encourage opportunistic behavior. Opportunistic behavior occurs when someone deliberately departs from the faithful representation of the economic event to benefit himself or others, generating a biased information. The subjects are influenced in their choice by a number of reasons, which may be internal or external nature. The external reasons are derived from capital markets, regulation, contracts, among others, while the internal are connected to the emotions, psychological profile, etc. The objective of this research was to determine whether opportunistic behavior in accounting choices is influenced by emotions and the personality trait of machiavellianism. A questionnaire was developed and 505 valid responses from students in their final year undergraduate and postgraduate were collected. With regard to the data processing, univariate and bivariate descriptive analysis of the variables, factor analysis for the development of the constructs of emotions and machiavellianism, and finally, multinomial logistic regression were performed to study the relationship between accounting choices and the demographic profile the constructs of emotions and machiavellianism. For the emotions, it was observed that while the negative promotes, the positive inhibit opportunistic behavior on accounting choices. About machiavellianism, the results indicate that amorality promotes and the desire to control inhibits opportunistic behavior on accounting choices. Based on the research findings we can infer that internal motivation should be observed, to the extent that positive emotions if promoted by market regulators and academia, and negative, if avoided, may contribute to inhibit corporate fraud. / Fraudes corporativas e outras pr??ticas lesivas podem encontrar suporte na contabilidade. Para gestores e preparadores das demonstra????es financeiras a presen??a de normas que permitem a discricionariedade na escolha de pr??ticas de reconhecimento e mensura????o pode favorecer o comportamento oportunista. Considera-se comportamento oportunista aquele que deliberadamente distancia da representa????o fidedigna do evento econ??mico para benef??cio pr??prio ou de terceiros, gerando uma informa????o com vi??s. Os sujeitos s??o influenciados no momento da escolha por uma s??rie de motiva????es, as quais podem ser de cunho interno ou externo. As de cunho externo s??o provenientes do mercado de capitais, da regula????o, de contratos, entre outros, enquanto as de cunho interno s??o ligadas ??s emo????es, perfil psicol??gico, etc. O objetivo desta pesquisa foi verificar se o comportamento oportunista nas escolhas cont??beis ?? influenciado pelas emo????es e pelo tra??o de personalidade do maquiavelismo. Para a operacionaliza????o de tal pesquisa foi desenvolvido um question??rio e coletadas 505 respostas v??lidas de alunos do ??ltimo ano de gradua????o e de p??s-gradua????o. No que concerne ao tratamento dos dados, foram realizadas an??lise descritiva univariada e bivariada das vari??veis, an??lise fatorial para o desenvolvimento dos constructos de emo????es e maquiavelismo e, por fim, uma regress??o log??stica multinomial para estudar a rela????o entre as escolhas cont??beis e o perfil dos respondentes, os constructos de emo????es e maquiavelismo. Os resultados obtidos indicaram que emo????es afetam o comportamento oportunista em escolhas cont??beis, sendo que as negativas promovem enquanto as positivas inibem. Sobre o maquiavelismo, os resultados indicam que amoralidade promove e desejo de controle inibe o comportamento oportunista em escolhas cont??beis. Com base nos resultados da pesquisa ?? poss??vel inferir que as motiva????es internas devem ser observadas, na medida em que as emo????es positivas, se promovidas pelos reguladores de mercado e academia, e as negativas se forem evitadas, podem contribuir para inibir fraudes corporativas.

År 2014 anmäldes 12 800 fall av bokföringsbrott. För att ett bokföringsbrott ska föreligga behöver brottsbalkens åsidosättande- och effektrekvisit uppfyllas. Åsidosättanderekvisitet uppfylls om bokföringsskyldigheten åsidosätts. I bokföringslagen står det föreskrivet att bokföringsskyldighet ska fullgöras på ett sätt som stämmer överens med god redovisningssed.Den statliga myndigheten Bokföringsnämnden har ett lagstadgat huvudansvar för utvecklandet av god redovisningssed. År 2004 beslutade Bokföringsnämnden att ändra inriktning av normgivningen för onoterade företag. I och med beslutet påbörjades arbetet med K-projektet med syftet att varje företagskategori ska ha ett heltäckande regelverk för upprättande av årsbokslut respektive årsredovisning. Den kategori som företag ska tillämpa baseras på de krav och val som innefattas av bokföringslagen. År 2014 blev det tvingande för onoterade företag att tillämpa ett K-regelverk.Syftet med denna studie har varit att undersöka möjligheten till bokföringsbrott om ett företag väljer att redovisa utanför det tillämpade K-regelverket och istället använder sig av en regel i ett annat K-regelverk, så kallad ”cherry-picking”. För att uppnå denna kvalitativa studies syfte har en deduktiv ansats använts för att genomföra en kartläggning av K-regelverkens relation till svensk lagstiftning, vilket har bidragit till en tydlig grund för studiens typfall. Typfallen har kompletterats med en intervju med en strategisk ekorevisor från Ekobrottsmyndigheten.Denna studies resultat visar att en avvikelse från K-regelverken kan anses vara synonymt med en avvikelse från god redovisningssed. I och med detta kan en avvikelse från K-regelverken anses vara ett åsidosättande av bokföringsskyldigheten. För att ett bokföringsbrott ska föreligga behöver det även påvisas att effektrekvisitet är uppfyllt. Ett uppfyllande av effektrekvisitet innebär att företagets räkenskaper inte går att bedöma i huvudsak. I de fall ett företag har valt att lämna information i not om avvikelse från K-regelverk kan det vara svårt att väcka åtal. Studiens resultat visar även att bestämmelserna i K-regelverken verkar ha företräde framför de redovisningsalternativ som årsredovisningslagen möjliggör.En koppling mellan god redovisningssed och K-regelverken har identifierats i denna studie men relationen mellan K-regelverken och lagen är inte helt säkerställd. Trots detta kan studiens resultat påvisa att det ar möjligt för företag att vid ”cherry-pickning” mellan K2 och K3 dömas för bokföringsbrott. / In 2014 there were 12,800 cases of accounting frauds reported in Sweden. According to Penal Code (Brottsbalken), classification of an accounting fraud needs to fulfill two requisites. The first requisite addresses the disregard of accounting obligation. The Accounting Act (Bokföringslagen) prescribes that the accounting obligation must be fulfilled in a manner consistent with generally accepted accounting principles (god redovisningssed).The Swedish Accounting Standards Board (Bokföringsnämnden) is a government authority that has a statutory responsibility for the development of generally accepted accounting principles. In 2004, the board changed its focus of the development of the accounting norms for unlisted companies. With this decision, they began to work on the K-project with the purpose of establishing a comprehensive framework of regulations for the companies’ annual accounts and annual reports. The regulations were divided into different categories based on the companies’ size which were constructed on the requirements and choices encompassed by the Accounting Act. The K-regulations (K-regelverken) became mandatory for unlisted companies in 2014.The purpose of this study was to investigate the possibility of accounting fraud if a company chooses to deviate from the applied K-regulation and instead use a rule from another K-regulation, what this study calls "cherry-picking". Therefore, this qualitative study utilizes a deductive approach and conducts a survey of K-regulations and their relation to Swedish legislation, which has contributed to a clear basis for the hypothetical cases in this study. The cases in this study have been supplemented by an interview with a strategic economic crime accountant from the Swedish Economic Crime Authority (Ekobrottsmyndigheten).The results of this study show that a deviation from the K-regulations can be considered synonymous with a deviation from the generally accepted accounting principles. With regards to this, a deviation from the K-regulations is seen as a disregard of the accounting obligation. In order to confirm an accounting fraud based on this, the second of the two requisites of Penal Code also needs to be fulfilled, the requisite of effect. The effect requisite is fulfilled when the essence of the accounts cannot be established. It may involve a certain difficulty to prosecute a company which has deviated from the K-regulation but included information in their accounts through their notes. The result of this study also shows that the provisions of the K-regulations takes precedence over the accounting options that the Annual Accounts Act (Årsredovisningslagen) offers.A link between generally accepted accounting principles and K-regulations has been identified in this study, but the relationship between K-regulations and the law is not fully specified. Despite this results of this study demonstrate the underlying risk that companies with applies "cherry-picking" between K2 and K3, may be convicted of accounting fraud.This study is hereinafter written in Swedish.

This diploma thesis entitled Accounting and Tax Frauds from Comparative Perspective of Czech and American Law and Practice analyses accounting frauds and tax frauds in the Czech Republic with added comparative aspects from the US. The purpose of the thesis divided to 6 chapters is to provide a complex and comprehensive analysis from the perspective of accounting, legal and justice system and police investigation and to propose original policy solutions how to improve combating this sophisticated economic criminal activities. This thesis is grounded in an interdisciplinary context and applies economics, taxes, accounting, law, criminology and forensic science. It also combines theoretical background with practical case study analysis. Stemming from the case study analysis and the comparative perspectives from the US, this thesis proposes practical solutions proposals for the police work. One of the common features of both Czech and the US system is the essential role of experts. The added value of this thesis includes 10 different proposals in the legislative, institutional, informational and practical police area, such as establishing special police unit tasked with accounting and audit frauds, protection of whistleblowers, more severe punishments, uniform tax software and electronic evidence, better coordination between police and the tax authorities, improving the education of policemen in the economic, tax and accounting area, cooperation with academia and police internships of economics students and also enhanced international cooperation. One cross-cutting finding is the absolute necessity of close and long-term cooperation and coordination between police, judiciary, tax authorities and academia, sharing knowledge, information and know-how and critically analysing recent trends and practical issues. That is the only way how to effectively improve the fight against this complex white-collar crime.