Financial Shenanigans (Fourth Edition)

How to Detect Accounting Gimmicks & Fraud in Financial Reports

By: Howard M. Schilit, Jeremy Perler, Yoni Engelhart

Narrated by: Scott Pollak

Length: 10 hrs and 21 mins

Publisher's summary

The best-selling classic from the “Sherlock Holmes of Accounting” - updated to reflect the key case studies and most important lessons from the past quarter century.

This fourth edition of the classic guide shines a light on the most shocking frauds and financial reporting offenders of the last 25 years and gives investors the tools they need to detect:

• Corporate cultures that incentivize dishonest practices
• The latest tricks companies use to exaggerate revenue and earnings
• Techniques devised by management to manipulate cash flow as easily as earnings
• Companies that use misleading metrics to fool investors about their financial performance
• How companies use acquisitions to hide deterioration in their underlying business

This new edition focuses on the key case studies and most important lessons from the past quarter century and brings you up to date on accounting chicanery in the global markets. Howard Schilit and his team of renowned forensic accounting experts expose financial reporting miscreants and unveil the latest methods companies use to mislead investors. You'll learn everything you need to know to unearth deceptive reporting and avoid costly mistakes.

©2018 Howard M. Schilit (P)2018 McGraw Hill-Ascent Audio

A must read

Whether you’re an accountant, lawyer, manager, or investor, this book will provide various frameworks for sniffing out BS. A required reading for both pros and posers.

Five stars

Five stars, very informative book, with very valuable real-life examples that you could look up and verify

Unexpectedly Juicy

Written by Howard M. Shilit, Jeremy Parker, and Yoni Englehart
I listened to the audiobook narrated by Scott Pollak. For my personal listening preference, I listened at 1.3 speed.

Even though some of the concepts presented were new to me, the authors explain things simply, and the entire book wasn’t full of complicated jargon. Many of the cases of financial shenanigans presented are fairly simply stated, and I found myself able to keep up with my limited knowledge of financial dealings.

I’m not even a big financial guru, but the stories about corporate, financial trickery were gripping to listen to. Some of these book cooking schemes were downright ridiculous, and I don’t want to use the phrase “enjoyable to listen to” because of how messed up some of the actions described were, but….

I liked that the authors repeated definitions of acronyms, and with my not being familiar with the terms, this helped solidify the terms in my mind as I listened.

Scott Pollak’s narration is generally crisp and clean. At one point, Pollak pronounces “scourge” as “scoowerge,” but the rest of the narration was very well done.

Overall, I highly recommend this audiobook if you are someone with a moderate base of knowledge in finance. The stories, delivery, and explanation of the situations surrounding the events are all done very well.