Benford's law [[electronic resource] ] : applications for forensic accounting, auditing, and fraud detection / / Mark J. Nigrini

• Autore: Nigrini Mark J (Mark John)
• Pubblicazione: Hoboken, N.J., : Wiley, 2012
• Descrizione fisica: 1 online resource (352 p.)
• Disciplina: 363.25/963
• Soggetto topico: Fraud - Prevention; Accounting fraud; Forensic accounting
• Classificazione: BUS001000
• Note generali: Description based upon print version of record.
• Nota di bibliografia: Includes bibliographical references and index.
• Nota di contenuto: BENFORD'S LAW: Applications for Forensic Accounting, Auditing, and Fraud Detection; Contents; Foreword; Preface; About the Author; Chapter 1: Introduction and Mathematical Foundations; Benford's Expected Digit Frequencies; Defining the First and First-Two Digits; Digit Patterns of U.S. Census Data; Logging on to Benford's Law; General Significant Digit Law; Log and Behold, the Census Data; Love at First Sight; Mantissa Test and Census Data; Number of Records and Benford's Law Tests; When Should Data Conform to Benford's Law?; Conclusions; Chapter 2: Theorems, Truisms, and a Little Trivia ; Digits of Corporate Payments Data Digits of Lake Data; Scale Invariance Theorem; Mean Absolute Deviation; Scale Invariance and Census Data; Scale Invariance and Corporate Payments; Scale Invariance and Lake Data; A Level Playing Field Becomes Benford; Multiplication by 1/X; All Distributions Lead to Benford; Getting a Gripf on Benford and Zipf; Conclusions; Chapter 3: More Formulas and Facts, and a Little Fibonacci; Fibonacci Numbers; Lucas Numbers; Back to Square One; 3n + 1 Problem; Ultimate Uniform Distribution; Benford Embraces Other Bases; Nigrini's Second Last Theorem; Conclusions ; Chapter 4: Primary Benford's Law Tests Corporate Payments Data; Data Profile; First Come, First Served; Playing Second Fiddle; First-Two Digits Test; Running the Digit Tests in Excel; Running the Digit Tests in Access; Conclusions; Chapter 5: Advanced Benford's Law Tests; Summation Test; Running the Summation Test in Excel; Running the Summation Test in Access; Second-Order Test; An Analysis of Payments Data; An Analysis of Journal Entry Data; An Analysis of Census Data; Running the Second-Order Test in Excel; Excel, Thanks a Million(s); Scale Invariance and the Second-Order Test; Conclusions ; Chapter 6: Associated Benford's Law Tests Number Duplication Test; An Analysis of Payments Data; An Analysis of Census Data; Running the Number Duplication Test in Excel; Running the Number Duplication Test in Access; Last-Two Digits Test; An Analysis of Payments Data; An Analysis of Census Data; An Analysis of Election Results; Running the Last-Two Digits Test in Excel; Running the Last-Two Digits Test in Access; Distortion Factor Model; Distortion and the Census Data; Conclusions; Chapter 7: Assessing Conformity to Benford's Law; Z-Statistic; Chi-Square Test; Kolmogorov-Smirnoff Test ; Mean Absolute Deviation Test The Logarithmic Basis of Benford's Law; Creating a Perfect Synthetic Benford Set; Mantissa Arc Test; Conclusions; Chapter 8: Examples of Fraudulent Data; The Inside Story; The Vendor Who Never Was; Not Paying Attention; Funny Money; The Heart of the Matter; Going the Extra Mile; Laugh All the Way to the Bank; Culture Shock; Having a Bad Hair Day; An Unclean Bill of Health; Turning the Table on Tax Evasion; Conclusions; Chapter 9: Fraudulent Financial Statements, Part I; Number Crunching; Wrong Numbers; A Look at Enron's and AIG's Numbers ; Figuring Out the Controllers
• Sommario/riassunto: "A powerful new tool for all forensic accountants, or anyone who analyzes data that may have been altered. Benford's Law gives the expected patterns of the digits in the numbers in tabulated data such as town and city populations or Madoff's fictitious portfolio returns. Those digits, in unaltered data, will not occur in equal proportions; there is a large bias towards the lower digits, so much so that nearly one-half of all numbers are expected to start with the digits 1 or 2. These patterns were originally discovered by physicist Frank Benford in the early 1930s, and have since been found to apply to all tabulated data. Mark J. Nigrini has been a pioneer in applying Benford's Law to auditing and forensic accounting, even before his groundbreaking 1999 Journal of Accountancy article introducing this useful tool to the accounting world. In Benford's Law, Nigrini shows the widespread applicability of Benford's Law and its practical uses to detect fraud, errors, and other anomalies. Explores primary, associated, and advanced tests, all described with data sets that include corporate payments data and election data Includes ten fraud detection studies, including vendor fraud, payroll fraud, due diligence when purchasing a business, and tax evasion Covers financial statement fraud, with data from Enron, AIG, and companies that were the target of hedge fund short sales Looks at how to detect Ponzi schemes, including data on Madoff, Waxenberg, and more Examines many other applications, from the Clinton tax returns and the charitable gifts of Lehman Brothers to tax evasion and number invention Benford's Law has 250 figures and uses 50 interesting authentic and fraudulent real-world data sets to explain both theory and practice, and concludes with an agenda and directions for future research. The companion website adds additional information and resources"--
• Titolo autorizzato: Benford's law
• ISBN: 1-119-20309-0; 1-118-28226-4; 1-280-59204-4; 9786613621870; 1-118-28686-3
• Formato: Materiale a stampa
• Livello bibliografico: Monografia
• Lingua di pubblicazione: Inglese
• Record Nr.: 9910141295503321
• Lo trovi qui: Univ. Federico II
• Serie: Wiley corporate F & A series.