Unpacking the global financial scandal nobody’s talking about

EDINBURGH — The Big Four accounting giants survived the global financial crisis, yet they had a hand in it. The Guardian, a respected global website and newspaper based in the UK, produced a feature earlier this year in which it unpicked what it calls the financial scandal no-one is talking about. Its journalist, Richard Brooks, outlines how accounting used to be a boring, easy job aimed at helping the rich count their booty, but it has metamorphosed into a highly lucrative industry that has eaten into the healthy parts of a capitalist system. – Jackie Cameron

By Thulasizwe Sithole

Accountancy used to be boring – and safe. But today it's neither. Have the 'big four' firms become too cosy with the system they're supposed to be keeping in check? That's the big question asked by The Guardian newspaper.

In an in-depth feature, writer Richard Brooks unpacks the worst financial crisis in decades – one that most of the business community and regulators have been ignoring. It is a story that starts with a reflection on how it is that auditing giant Ernst & Young remained unscathed after too-big-to-fail Lehman Brothers collapsed in 2008, a shock that played into the global financial crisis.

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