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Two Sets Of Books
The concept of "two sets of books" refers to the practice of keeping two sets of accounting ledgers ("books"). In colloquial terms, this practice may refer to fraudulent behavior, i.e. attempting to hide or disguise financial transactions from outsiders by having a falsified set of records for official use and another for internal recordkeeping. It may be done for legitimate reasons as well. Fraud Having two sets of books enables a company to use one set for tax authorities and another for investors. The goal is to maximize income for financial statements in one set while showing lower income on the other set in order to avoid paying higher taxes. Legal practice Keeping "two sets of books" does not always refer to an illegal practice. Publicly-traded companies might maintain two sets of accounting records while still abiding by the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) rules for preparing financial statements and the Internal Revenue Code The Internal Revenue Cod ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Public Company
A public company is a company whose ownership is organized via shares of share capital, stock which are intended to be freely traded on a stock exchange or in over-the-counter (finance), over-the-counter markets. A public (publicly traded) company can be listed on a stock exchange (listing (finance), listed company), which facilitates the trade of shares, or not (unlisted public company). In some jurisdictions, public companies over a certain size must be listed on an exchange. In most cases, public companies are ''private'' enterprises in the ''private'' sector, and "public" emphasizes their reporting and trading on the public markets. Public companies are formed within the legal systems of particular states and so have associations and formal designations, which are distinct and separate in the polity in which they reside. In the United States, for example, a public company is usually a type of corporation, though a corporation need not be a public company. In the United Kin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Financial Accounting Standards Board
The Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) is a private standard-setting body whose primary purpose is to establish and improve Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) within the United States in the public's interest. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) designated the FASB as the organization responsible for setting accounting standards for public companies in the U.S. The FASB replaced the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants' (AICPA) Accounting Principles Board (APB) on July 1, 1973. The FASB is run by the nonprofit Financial Accounting Foundation. FASB accounting standards are accepted as authoritative by many organizations, including state Boards of Accountancy and the American Institute of CPAs (AICPA). Structure The FASB is based in Norwalk, Connecticut, and is led by seven full-time Board members,Spiceland, David; Sepe, James; Nelson, Mark; & Tomassini, Lawrence (2009). ''Intermediate Accounting'' (5th Edition). McGraw-Hill/ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Internal Revenue Code
The Internal Revenue Code of 1986 (IRC), is the domestic portion of federal statutory tax law in the United States. It is codified in statute as Title 26 of the United States Code. The IRC is organized topically into subtitles and sections, covering federal income tax in the United States, payroll taxes, estate taxes, gift taxes, and excise taxes; as well as procedure and administration. The Code's implementing federal agency is the Internal Revenue Service. Origins of tax codes in the United States Prior to 1874, U.S. statutes (whether in tax law or other subjects) were not codified. That is, the acts of Congress were not organized and published in separate volumes based on the subject matter (such as taxation, bankruptcy, etc.). Codifications of statutes, including tax statutes, undertaken in 1873 resulted in the Revised Statutes of the United States, approved June 22, 1874, effective for the laws in force as of December 1, 1873. Title 35 of the Revised Statutes was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tax Evasion
Tax evasion or tax fraud is an illegal attempt to defeat the imposition of taxes by individuals, corporations, trusts, and others. Tax evasion often entails the deliberate misrepresentation of the taxpayer's affairs to the tax authorities to reduce the taxpayer's tax liability, and it includes dishonest tax reporting, declaring less income, profits or gains than the amounts actually earned, overstating deductions, bribing authorities and hiding money in secret locations. Tax evasion is an activity commonly associated with the informal economy. One measure of the extent of tax evasion (the "tax gap") is the amount of unreported income, which is the difference between the amount of income that the tax authority requests be reported and the actual amount reported. In contrast, tax avoidance is the legal use of tax laws to reduce one's tax burden. Both tax evasion and tax avoidance can be viewed as forms of tax noncompliance, as they describe a range of activities that intend to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Accounting Ethics
Accounting ethics is primarily a field of applied ethics and is part of business ethics and human ethics, the study of moral values and judgments as they apply to accountancy. It is an example of professional ethics. Accounting was introduced by Luca Pacioli, and later expanded by government groups, professional organizations, and independent companies. Ethics are taught in accounting courses at higher education institutions as well as by companies training accountants and auditors. Due to the wide range of accounting services and recent corporate collapses, attention has been drawn to ethical standards accepted within the accounting profession. These collapses have resulted in a widespread disregard for the reputation of the accounting profession. To combat the criticism and prevent fraudulent accounting, various accounting organizations and governments have developed regulations and remedies for improved ethics among the accounting profession. Importance of ethics The natu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Creative Accounting
Creative accounting is a euphemism referring to accounting practices that may follow the letter of the rules of standard accounting practices, but deviate from the spirit of those rules with questionable accounting ethics—specifically distorting results in favor of the "preparers", or the firm that hired the accountant. They are characterized by excessive complication and the use of novel ways of characterizing income, assets, or liabilities, and the intent to influence readers towards the interpretations desired by the authors. The terms "innovative" or "aggressive" are also sometimes used. Another common synonym is "cooking the books". Creative accounting is oftentimes used in tandem with outright financial fraud (including securities fraud), and lines between the two are blurred. Creative accounting practices have been known since ancient times and appear world-wide in various forms. The term as generally understood refers to systematic misrepresentation of the true incom ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
