Leon Gettler at Sox First is blogging about detecting fraud. He mentions a study, Predicting Material Accounting Manipulations, and says the following about it: “A new study reveals that price-earnings ratios and market-to-book ratios are unusually high prior to the fiddling of the books. Also, firms that engage in this sort of activity have had unusually strong stock price performance in the years prior to the misdeeds. So you don’t really see it coming.”
Sam Antar is blogging about Patrick Byrne, the CEO of Overstock.com. Byrne has been trying for months to take attention off of Overstocks unusual accounting issues and contradictions by executives in the quarterly conference calls. Sam tells it like it is, and Byrne’s smear campaign continues on.
Gary Weiss has noted that the Overstock.com board of directors may actually be paying attention to this smear campaign initiated by CEO Byrne and carried out largely by the hired help, Judd Bagley. Bagley’s site Antisocial Media was the playground for those making anti-Semitic remarks and for those threatening people who asked questions about Overstock, and Sam Antar notified the Overstock board of this fact. (As if they didn’t already know.) Shortly thereafter, some of the more egregious comments were removed from the site. Did the board finally step in?
Trusted Advisor discusses the relationship between credentials and trust. In academia, for example, credentials are relied upon heavily and confer some credibility. Yet we may be moving into a time when credentials don’t mean as much as they used to. For example, today’s bachelor’s degree is what the high school diploma used to be… a line in the sand that excludes some people for consideration for certain jobs. Clearly, the credentials themselves are changing, and what they convey is changing as well.
The Texas attorney general finally took action against multi-level marketing company Mannatech. Many have been waiting for this for several months. The company’s representatives have long been claiming that the company’s sugar pills cure everything from cancer to epilepsy and any other ailment that you can imagine. The AG’s office has sued Mannatech and is seeking a permanent injunction against the company and its founder.
Tags: Sox, fraud, smear campaign, multi-level marketing, Mannatech
09 Jul 07 at 7:44 pm
Looks like Sam Caster is headed for his second business bankruptcy.
MLM is a flawed system I recommend Dr Taylor at
mlm-thetruth.com
or pyramidschemealert.org