In September 2016, Wells Fargo, a bank with its head office in San Francisco, California came under fire for a huge scandal, which involved accusations of fraudulent sales practices. Employees of the bank opened around 3.2 million fake accounts due to the fact that the culture at Wells Fargo put a lot of pressure onto its employees to reach unrealistic sales goals, causing some employees to even break the law. Since the scandal broke out, the bank has relieved about 5,300 employees due to their illegal behavior and has also gotten rid of the extreme sales goals. The bank was also investigated by Federal prosecutors and Congressional overseers and California, Illinois and Chicago have all put their business partnership with the bank on hold since the event. Continue reading…

The Financial Reporting Council (FRC) proposes, subject to consultation, to issue a revised version of International Standard on Auditing (UK) (ISA (UK) 315 (Revised June 2016) Identifying and Assessing the Risks of Material Misstatement Through Understanding the Entity and Its Environment, to reflect recent revisions to the international standards on auditing issued by the International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board (IAASB).

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by Michel Klompmaker

The Green Swan is a book written by qualified professionals from the Banque De France and the Bank for International Settlements (BIS). It examines the link between the effects of climate change and the stability of the financial sector. It also provides an in-depth survey of how global warming has slowly integrated into macroeconomic models and how they have progressively evolved to form better assessments of stability risks that arise from the phenomenon of climate change. On the other hand, this book also acknowledges the limitations of models and how they may not be able to accurately foresee the financial and economic impact of climate change. Continue reading…

The Governing Council of the European Central Bank (ECB) launched a review of its monetary policy strategy. The monetary policy strategy was adopted in 1998 and some of its elements were clarified in 2003. Since 2003 the euro area and the world economy have been undergoing profound structural changes. Declining trend growth, on the back of slowing productivity and an ageing population, as well as the legacy of the financial crisis, have driven interest rates down, reducing the scope for the ECB and other central banks to ease monetary policy by conventional instruments in the face of adverse cyclical developments.

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Environment Agency launches campaign (red. in UK) to highlight the impact flood damage has on mental health, advising people on the importance of signing up to flood alerts. Experiencing damage caused by extreme weather such as storms or flooding can increase the chance of facing mental health problems such as stress and depression by 50% while a quarter of people who have been flooded still live with these issues at least two years after the event. This is according to research highlighted by the Environment Agency this Flood Action Week as it urges people to be better prepared for the potentially devastating impacts of flooding.

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