Busy Season Madness! Meet the Ethics & Compliance Division
If you need to catch up on the rest of the playing field check out our posts on the Audit Division, Tax Division and Cash Flow Division.
Thanks to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act nearly 20 years ago, accountants have played an ever-growing role in Ethics & Compliance. This division's competitors will highlight various fraudsters, con-men, and money launderers.
Just a reminder that polls will open this Thursday so you can vote for your favorite accounting characters in each round, and follow me on Twitter for regular updates.
Without further adieu, the Cash Flow Division:
#1 Seed: Frank Abagnale, Jr. – “Catch Me If You Can”
A great forger of checks, and one-time fake pilot, doctor, and lawyer. Is he the real deal, or did he con his way into the #1 seed as well?
#2 Seed: Ryan Howard – “The Office”
It is widely mentioned in The Office that Ryan went to business school. However, there is no talk of any ethics courses, which could have prevented Ryan’s astronomical ascension then even quicker collapse due to double-booking sales.
#3 Seed: Danny Ocean – “Ocean’s Eleven”
There are con-men, and then there are con-noisseurs. Danny Ocean is the latter, and is guaranteed to suck two hours of your life if you stumble upon him on TNT.
#4 Seed: Mark Whitacre – “The Informant!”
One day Whitacre is whistle-blowing his employer’s price fixing tactics, then the next he’s embezzling funds himself. Who knows which persona will show up at tip-off??
#5 Seed: George Bluth Sr. – “Arrested Development”
A notoriously fraudulent and unscrupulous businessman, the Patriarch of the Bluth Family somehow keeps his family intact despite all of the chaos, drama, and hilarity that ensues.
#6 Seed: Henry Gondorff and Johnny Hooker – “The Sting”
Two con men team up to turn the tables against a mob boss. Can they double-team their opponents into the second round?
#7 Seed: Jimmy Pope – “Syriana”
Killen Oil CEO Jimmy Pope claims to have the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act committed to memory, yet it’s still unclear how his relatively small oil company won lucrative drilling rights to overseas oilfields.
#8 Seed: Michael Corleone – “The Godfather”
Either the olive oil business is highly lucrative, or the Corleone’s are running some unsavory business practices. Auditors, don’t hold your breath if you’re waiting on that PBC list…
#9 Seed: Frank Lucas – “American Gangster”
Lucas built an empire on heroin, then after his downfall tried to redeem himself by exposing the corrupt police officers who he had bribed throughout the years.
#10 Seed: Neal Caffrey – “White Collar”
A former con-man himself, Caffrey works as a consultant for the FBI’s white collar crime division.
#11 Seed: Gustavo Fring – “Breaking Bad”
Fring built the successful Los Pollos Hermanos restaurant chain, which he used to conceal the profits from his drug empire. The real crime would be if his restaurant applied for PPP loans despite sitting on a mountain of drug money.
#12 Seed: Dick Harper – “Fun with Dick and Jane”
Dick is an executive with Globodyne who becomes the scapegoat for corporate greed as his boss Jack McCallister secretly dumps millions in shares just before the company’s epic collapse. Who were their auditors??
#13 Seed: Gavin Belson – “Silicon Valley”
The namesake of the Belson Institute of Tethics (Tech & Ethics) admitted that ethics was in fact not a priority in building tech-company Hooli into a billionaire dollar business.
#14 Seed: Irving Rosenfeld – “American Hustle”
A con artist who is conned into conning con-gressmen.
#15 Seed: Warden Samuel Norton – “The Shawshank Redemption”
Warden Norton claims that he believes in two things – discipline and the Bible. He conveniently left out the part about accepting bribes and laundering money.
#16 Seed: Stacy Keach – “American Greed”
The iconic voice of the CNBC show “American Greed”, Keach regales viewers with tales of financial fraud and deceit.
Stay tuned for our next post on the Ethics & Compliance Division, and remember to follow me on Twitter for regular Busy Season Madness updates!