Creative Accounting and the Possibility of Its Detection in the Evaluation of the Company by Expert

Abstract

The value of the company is influenced by a large group of factors that experts should take into account, in the evaluation process, and incorporate into their calculations. The paper is based on the knowledge and experience gained from more than 15 years of forensic practice and more than 60 expert opinions related to determining the value of the company. It clearly states, in selected two representative companies, how significantly creative accounting can influence the final value of the company. Therefore, it is necessary to think about how to eliminate these possible interventions in the process of valuing the company. Background: Creative accounting is an important issue that is being addressed worldwide. It can have significant impacts in many areas, but in the article, we focus specifically on the area of determining the value of the company in the companies of the Slovak Republic. Methods: Several methods are used, such as specifically selected methods of creative accounting, methods of determining the general value of the company’s assets, specifically the property method, and the business method were applied to companies. Subsequently, selected methods of determining creative accounting were used in the work. The Beneish model and the Piotroski model were selected for the needs of the expert’s methodological procedures. Results: From all the findings in our study, it follows that interventions in accounting can have a significant impact on the resulting value of the company. It depends on what kind of intervention is applied to the accounts and whether the expert is able to detect it. Conclusions: The result of the research, which is described in the article, is a proposal for the use of selected methods of detection of creative accounting by experts in the evaluation process. The paper proposes a coefficient of creative accounting, which adjusts the resulting value of the company. It is the first design created by longer-term research. In the process of determining the value of the company in the conditions of the Slovak Republic, interventions of this kind have not yet been applied to the final value. The proposed coefficient is one of several proposals that were the result of the dissertation.