MF Global may have engaged in “window dressing,” reducing its level of debt before reporting its finances each quarter so as to appear less risky to investors, according to an analysis by the Wall Street Journal.
Despite all the laws enacted since Enron and Lehman Brothers, this trick is still being used. Other tricks still in use:
– accelerating revenues;
– delaying expenses;
– accelerating expenses preceding an acquisition;
– “Non-Recurring Expenses”;
– “Other” income or expense;
– off-balance-sheet items; and
– synthetic leases.
