FORENSIC ACCOUNTING
WHAT WE DO
We assist our Clients as independent consultants in the management of accounting and financial fraud risks, examining the cases of fraud of which they are victims, or advising them on how to prevent them. We support them with opinions, reports and economic assessments of the damages they suffer due to internal mismanagement, violations or misappropriation and misuse of assets or business units. We provide accounting investigation services for companies, in case of debt restructuring or corporate insolvency, and independent audits of accounts.
Our forensic accounting and fraud examination skills are constantly integrated and updated with the best practices of professional associations and bodies such as the US Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE).
OUR EXPERIENCE
In the field of forensic accounting, we have assisted Clients in the aerospace, Italian design, banking, and electronic communications sectors. Some examples are the following:
- we carried out a fraud examination of the previous board of directors and supervisory board, and calculated the mismanagement damage suffered by the company;
- we identified acts of directors defrauding creditors of a company in financial distress, and assessed the economic damage caused to that company's assets;
- we assessed in criminal proceedings for stock manipulation any anomalies in the performance of a security related to securities purchase transactions of a listed company, using the main market abuse detection tools;
- we carried out an independent audit of financial statements, invoices issued and received, and sales forecasts, in a litigation;
- we carried out an economic analysis of the fairness of the prices paid by our client, by means of an audit and the construction of a market benchmark.
WHAT IS FORENSIC ACCOUNTING?
Forensic accounting is the application of accounting and its principles in a judicial context or in the context of proceedings initiated by other national or supranational authorities. It involves the production of professionally produced and documented opinions and pleadings concerning economic and financial transactions, valuations and financial matters.
Closely related to forensic accounting is fraud examination, which is a methodology for verifying the existence of fraud schemes, from the initial identification of possible conducts to the testimony before judicial bodies.
Fraud examination uses forensic accounting methodologies but, as frauds are usually carried out in secret, it also requires intensive interaction with possible witnesses of the frauds carried out.
Forensic accounting and fraud examination are different from auditing: being frauds, they are often recorded apparently correctly, documented and in accordance with accounting standards. They may therefore not be detected by an audit. For this reason, it is necessary to use specialised investigative techniques.