We've Been Out-Snarked

We here at 10-key Tramp consider ourselves to be a snarky bunch. It's just our nature, so we run with it. We'll poke fun, often in a mean-spirited fashion, at those who are deserving (SEC, KPMG, PCAOB, PwC, Maxine Waters [you're always #1 to us]).

Well, Dennis Howlett, at AccMan, just raised the bar with this awesome headline:

AccountancyAge, The Guardian: you’re a bunch of douche bags

And a little taste:

Here’s the bottom line on this mess. If PWC’s Indian ‘associates’ were involved with consulting arrangements then PWC should have recused itself from any audit activity. Let’s give them a break and assume they were free and clear. How the heck did the audit partners manage to miss $1 bn (roughly) cash that Satyam’s CEO admits went missing? The answer is a simple fraud I learned about the first six months I was training. Rule no.1: seek independent proof of cash balances. So if PWC…errr…Lovelock & Lewes…err who the heck? missed that then they were either monumentally stupid (ergo fiscally liable) or…I don’t know what.

First: Bravo, DH.

Now after you finish laughing, go ahead and read the whole post because he makes his case. The coverage in the UK has been taking PwC at its lame PR word re: Satyam. We didn't even report their coverage here because it basically looked like they did the copy and paste technique right out of the press release.

Meanwhile, the coverage in the states has been, at the very least, sympathetic, and the typical all that's fit to print mantra courtesy of the NYT.

So the point is, the coverage on this whole story is at its worst, pathetic, and at its best, typical. The repercussions of this fraud are serious and as DH points out, the accounting profession is in a serious downward spiral. The "best" firms continue to prove that they are totally complacent about their "responsibilities" due to their arrogant oligopolistic stranglehold on the profession.

Smaller and second-tier firms, meanwhile, could be shitting gold bricks for their clients (and some probably do) and no one would notice (unless, of course, they screw up; that's you, BDO).

Somehow we've channeled some Dennis's rage over here...

AccountancyAge, The Guardian: you’re a bunch of douche bags [AccMan]

Sphere: Related Content