The End of Accounting and the Path Forward for Investors and Managers (Hardcover)

Acknowledgments xi

The Book in a Nutshell xiii

Prologue xxv

CHAPTER 1 Corporate Reporting Then and Now: A Century of “Progress” 1

CHAPTER 2 And You Thought Earnings Are the Bottom Line 15

PART ONE Matter of Fact 27

CHAPTER 3 The Widening Chasm between Financial Information and Stock Prices 29

CHAPTER 4 Worse Than at First Sight 41

CHAPTER 5 Investors’ Fault or Accounting’s? 50

CHAPTER 6 Finally, For the Still Unconvinced 61

CHAPTER 7 The Meaning of It All 67

PART TWO Why Is the Relevance Lost? 77

CHAPTER 8 The Rise of Intangibles and Fall of Accounting 81

CHAPTER 9 Accounting: Facts or Fiction? 94

CHAPTER 10 Sins of Omission and Commission 104

PART THREE So, What’s to Be Done? 113

CHAPTER 11 What Really Matters to Investors (and Managers) 119

CHAPTER 12 Strategic Resources & Consequences Report: Case No. I—Media and Entertainment 133

CHAPTER 13 Strategic Resources & Consequences Report: Case No. 2—Property and Casualty Insurance 146

CHAPTER 14 Strategic Resources & Consequences Report:

Case No. 3—Pharmaceutics and Biotech 163

CHAPTER 15 Strategic Resources & Consequences Report:

Case No. 4—Oil and Gas Companies 179

PART FOUR Practical Matters 197

CHAPTER 16 Implementation 199

CHAPTER 17 So, What to Do with Accounting? A Reform Agenda 213

CHAPTER 18 Investors’ Operating Instructions 230

Epilogue: Advocacy Needed 241

Author Index 243

Subject Index 247