The content of this course centers around three main topics: Accounting research, regulations, and ethics. As we cover topics in each of these content areas, you will be challenged to think about the implications of each issue from the perspective of both a financial manager working in industry and that of an external auditor. -Define ethics and one's ethical obligations in an accounting context.

Goals and Objectives:

-Describe the ethical reasoning processes that occur in an accounting context.

-Work through an ethical decision in an accounting context.

-Explain the role of competency as it relates to ethical behavior.

-Evaluate one of the major ethical failures in an accounting context from the past 15 years.

-Define earnings management.

-Explain the difference between the use of accounting discretion and fraud.

-Explain how financial managers' use their accounting discretion to manage earnings.

-Identify the various earnings management techniques that have been used in financial reporting.

-Explain the challenge auditors have related to earnings management.

-Evaluate and discuss the implementation issues associated with recently issued accounting guidance.

-Determine the implications of fair value accounting.

-Work through specific valuation issues associated with fair value accounting.

-Evaluate the role of fair value accounting on the subprime lending problem.

-Describe the roles of the various regulators that impact financial managers and auditors.