Respond to fellow student’s posts

Read other students’ posts and respond to other students.

To receive full credit you must start your post using the name of the person you are responding to.

Evaluate and positively critique each of the 2 selected posts and assign a grade of 1(lowest) to 5 (highest) and explain in detail the elements of the post and criteria used in assigning your grade. Criteria considerations are: correctness of information, clarity of explanation, ability to convey information briefly or succinctly, proper spelling and grammar, etc.

Each reply posting is worth up to 2.5 points (Max 5). No late postings are given credit.

5 Responds from these discussions

1.The Sarbanes Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) or also called the “truth in securities act”, was created in response to accounting scandals within corporations. This act is intended to regulate corporate governance and to set regulations within corporations. The act contains 11 sections and was signed in to legislature by President George Bush. The primary creators of the act were Senator Paul Sarbanes and Representative Michael Oxley.

The creation of SOX has put a mandated expectation on companies for the following key items addressed by the act:

Reports provided by signing officers must be reviewed by them and certified that they are accurate. The signing officers are also responsible for internal controls within their companies to make sure that the data they are providing on the report is accurate. Signing officers cannot transfer their duties outside the U.S

Financial reports are to be published and must be transparent and accurate.

Corporations are required to publish information about internal controls and procedures for financial reporting.

Corporations are also required to publish publicly right away any changes in the financial health of the company. All disclosures must be transparent and easy to understand.

Violations of the act can impose penalties and fine and/or up to 20 years in jail for altering, destroying, mutilating, concealing, and falsifying records. Also, accountants who certify false information can face penalties and fines and jail time for up to 10 years and the in-ability to perform certification duties for up to five years.

Additional information about this act can be found at https://www.sec.gov/about/laws.shtml.

Unfortunately, there are times even with the act in place where companies continue fraud on financial reporting. An example was in October of 2013, where Clean Diesel was found in violating the whistleblower protection provisions when the CFO reported a conflict of interest of finances to the company’s Board of Directors and was fired for it. Please see link below for more on the article.

https://www.osha.gov/pls/oshaweb/owadisp.show_document?p_table=NEWS_RELEASES&p_id=24915