I continue to be surprised....

... by the number of seemingly intelligent people who can’t accept that the losses incurred by banks – and others – were real and not merely a result of accounting standards.

Over the past few weeks there have been a number of letters to the Editor of the Financial Times suggesting that accounting rules were to blame.  Now, I am not responsible for setting accounting standards, and I may not always agree with them, but I am clear that there have been real losses incurred and real cash has been lost.

I am not generally a write of letters to the Press but it seemed to me that someone should put the record straight – and I am pleased that the FT decided to publish my letter (you can read it via this link if you have not seen it    http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ca73cb8e-f8cf-11de-beb8-00144feab49a.html?nclick_check=1 ).

I appreciate that not everyone supports ‘Mark to Market’ but surely no one can seriously believe that accounting standards can cause the havoc we have seen in financial markets and in the global economy.

 Standards & Regulators  1 Comments January 6th, 2010