So far this year, the story of the stock market has undoubtedly been the rocket ships that crypto and AI stocks have turned into. But, under the water, there’s another trend I’ve seen: more companies than I can ever remember are having trouble with accounting, internal controls, and covenant compliance, and it’s causing real impacts to their business.
The accounting profession is seeing an exodus of talent and can't replace them quick enough. Terrible hours and not enough money. The reddit sub /accounting makes for really good reading. A lot of offshoring to India, which has not worked very well.
I worked in PA audit/tax after college and I couldn't imagine any scenario where I would go back. Ever.
I think the real issue is ethics/morality. Accounting is language. A better analogy would be accountants and auditors are referees in the game of business. As firm and personal profit take precedence over public interest, you are going to see more of this. Add complexity, and you only increase the chances for trouble. All the comments below are relevent to some degree. The profession is underpaid, overworked, not respected and lacking the infusion of new talent. I am one of those is in the next five years or so is on my way out. I am appalled at what I see across the board. Things won't change until the big 4 monopoly is broken and more classes on ethics are required. The SEC/PCAOB are too lenient and allow too many loopholes. There needs to be audit only firms instead of the mix we have now. Just my nickel (accounting for inflation)...
As a FT GAAP accountant, I think about this a lot, I think with proliferation of computers and cheap calculation, transactions of all types (leases, revenue, financing, etc.) have become more complex, which has required more complex rule making by the FASB in response, which has upped the skill set required of corporate accountants and auditors to the point where for some transaction types only a handful nationally really “get it.” This makes them 1) hard for the corporate accountants to get right, and 2) hard for the auditors to audit (because they spend lots of time going in circles or undoing previous mistakes). Also, tech has probably taken a lot of new talent over the past 10 years (audit doesn’t pay well) meaning a lot of the front line folks are less ready for the challenge.
I note your comment: “Accounting is the language of business.”
This used to be true for hundreds of years.
However, today it’s more accurate to say: “Accounting has become the arcane language of accountants who have little knowledge of business. Accounting standards have become less and less relevant to the operations of business and less and less relevant to investors.”
The accounting profession is seeing an exodus of talent and can't replace them quick enough. Terrible hours and not enough money. The reddit sub /accounting makes for really good reading. A lot of offshoring to India, which has not worked very well.
I worked in PA audit/tax after college and I couldn't imagine any scenario where I would go back. Ever.
I think the real issue is ethics/morality. Accounting is language. A better analogy would be accountants and auditors are referees in the game of business. As firm and personal profit take precedence over public interest, you are going to see more of this. Add complexity, and you only increase the chances for trouble. All the comments below are relevent to some degree. The profession is underpaid, overworked, not respected and lacking the infusion of new talent. I am one of those is in the next five years or so is on my way out. I am appalled at what I see across the board. Things won't change until the big 4 monopoly is broken and more classes on ethics are required. The SEC/PCAOB are too lenient and allow too many loopholes. There needs to be audit only firms instead of the mix we have now. Just my nickel (accounting for inflation)...
As a FT GAAP accountant, I think about this a lot, I think with proliferation of computers and cheap calculation, transactions of all types (leases, revenue, financing, etc.) have become more complex, which has required more complex rule making by the FASB in response, which has upped the skill set required of corporate accountants and auditors to the point where for some transaction types only a handful nationally really “get it.” This makes them 1) hard for the corporate accountants to get right, and 2) hard for the auditors to audit (because they spend lots of time going in circles or undoing previous mistakes). Also, tech has probably taken a lot of new talent over the past 10 years (audit doesn’t pay well) meaning a lot of the front line folks are less ready for the challenge.
Show me the incentives and I'll show you the outcome.
I note your comment: “Accounting is the language of business.”
This used to be true for hundreds of years.
However, today it’s more accurate to say: “Accounting has become the arcane language of accountants who have little knowledge of business. Accounting standards have become less and less relevant to the operations of business and less and less relevant to investors.”
Always worth the read