Europe sees WorldCom scandal as "American disease"

Reuters ^

[Petronski]

Yeah, there's never been fraud in Europe. Right.

[B.O. Plenty]

You have to wonder what is being taught at business schools for the last 20 years.....surely not fraud and deception? Or maybe they are not putting enough emphasis on the techniques of how not to get caught......

[crypt2k]

1) I've never even heard of World Com!

2) Let's not forget about the German disease, the French disease, the Russian disease, etc.

3) My mutual fund has dropped 50% in the last 9 months, and today I'm withdrawing the remains.

[general_re]

This is crap. Until recently, trying to figure out something simple, like, say, if a company listed on the Dax (and not listed on a US exchange)) was even profitable was an exercise in aggravation. The Euros have had some of the most obtuselyfuzzy accounting and disclosure requirements for publicly traded companies for decades now, but suddenly they're going to sieze the moral high ground? I think not.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Don't dump now. You don't take the loss til you sell. A year from now, we'll hve the terrorists stuffed in a can, Republicans running the senate and all will be well.

[triplejake]

Unfortunately, this is one case where the perceptions of the Euros about the relative merits of their accounting versus ours may matter more than the truth. Tons of money has been pumped into US financial markets from abroad because of the strong dollar and the perception that our companies were solid investments. With both of those premises weakening, that money is flowing out, which will be a drag on our markets for a long time.

[GovernmentShrinker]

Yeah, right. The accounting at Metallgesellschaft was just dandy.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Easy for you to say.

[general_re]

Yeah, as much as I hate to admit it, you've got a good point - perception is all that matters much of the time. I think it'll depend in large part upon what the response is among accounting firms and the SEC - they all need to move aggressively to nip this sort of thing in the bud. Gotta fight back to keep the perception from becoming that the US markets are no more transparent than some third-world banana republic...

[mondonico]

OK. And Communism, socialism, Nazism, and genocide are European diseases.

[SunStar]

I guess the disease is that they actually get caught eventually here in the States...

[Helms]

"'You have to wonder what is being taught at business schools for the last 20 years.....""

Apparently what was taught in Law Schools to Bill and Hillary.

What a sad and disgusting subset of the boomer generation.

Peace and Love, but keep an eye on your wallet at all times.

[ChasingFletch]

"Complexity is the enemy of good accounting,"......

Greed and underhanded deals are the enemy of good accounting.

Does anyone have a list of all these companies that have had to fold under the weight of their own corruption lately? Is there a source on this subject?

[Timesink]

Boy, are these absurd, arrogant asses about to be in for a RUDE surprise. It's only a matter of time until a European company gets caught doing the same thing. And then another. And then another. Finance these days is an internation business. If this crap was going on in the US, it's a virtual guarantee it's also going on in Europe, Asia, Australia, on and on. The only difference is that the securities regulators in all those countries are members of the same snooty, socialist chattering classes as the board members of the companies they claim to monitor. The powerful protecting the powerful, as O'Reilly likes to say. This will work for a while, but eventually all the accounting tricks in the world will be unable to stop the collapse of a company that truly doesn't have any money.

[1rudeboy]

Our bubble burst first. (While most of their economies were in recession). Their time will come.

[norraad]

Yes, I suppose it's time to admit they all do it.

A virtual "Kings New Clothes" fashion show.

Who's next?

I suspect a certain oil company who's been also capitalizing with debt.

Anyone else?

[Tijeras_Slim]

And yet these euro-trashniks still love the 'toon.

[gunnedah]

Greed and Fraud are not prevalent only in the USA,it is all over the globe.But here we always have the RULE OF LAW to protect the rich and powerful.

[College Repub]

Worldcom owns MCI. It carrys 1/4 of all long distnace calls in the US. It transmits 1/3 of all data...worldwide...

In other words, although I do not know what ISP you are on, nor do I know where you are from. However, there is a 33% chance that WorldCom is providing the backbone that enables you to post your messages on FR.