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The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) brought charges against 69 accountants for failing to register with the Public Company Accounting Board (PCAB) earlier this week. This somewhat obscure action is the latest ripple in the wave of crackdowns that followed the Enron accounting scandals in 2001 -- to break up the all too cozy relationship between auditors and the multinationals that they are supposed to be policing. Read More

The European Union's secretive decision-making processes were condemned on Thursday in a legal judgment that should lead to more light being shed on how thousands of regulations affecting businesses are hatched. Read More

Originally posted at Dirt Digger's Digest on September 23, 2008 -- A number of leading Democrats and Republicans expressed strong misgivings last Monday about the autocratic plan for bailing out Wall Street that Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson wants to ram through Congress. It remains to be seen whether this is mere posturing or serious opposition. Read More

There's something peculiar in the report on financial market regulation issued March 31 by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson. The plan, touted by some as a bold expansion of federal control over capital markets and dismissed by others as a mere rearranging of the deck chairs on the financial Titanic, includes an incongruous section on the insurance industry. Read More

The rescue of Bear Stearns faced further scrutiny in Congress on Tuesday as a powerful Democratic lawmaker demanded more information on the selection of BlackRock as investment manager for $30bn in the bank's mortgage assets. Read More

Countrywide Financial made risky loans to tens of thousands of Americans, helping set off a chain of events that has the economy staggering. So it may come as a surprise that a dozen former top Countrywide executives now stand to make millions from the home mortgage mess, buying up delinquent home mortgages that the government took over, sometimes for pennies on the dollar, at newly-formed PennyMac. Read More

The world's leading ozone destroyer takes credit for leadership in ozone protection. A major agrichemical manufacturer trades in a pesticide so hazardous it has been banned in many countries, while implying it is helping feed the hungry. Read More