Audit Notes: Amazon turns on the A/C, Fairfax’s taxes, Ponzify

By Ryan Chittum   Jun 6, 2012 at 11:53 PM

The Morning Call's Spencer Soper follows up on his Amazon sweatshop investigation, and reports that the company has since spent... More

Audit Notes: that 1930s feeling, Facebook small fry, Carter’s Grove

Martin Wolf’s hair is on fire

By Ryan Chittum   Jun 5, 2012 at 08:21 PM

Martin Wolf's hair is on fire in the Financial Times: Suppose that in June 2007 you had been told that... More

David Cay Johnston’s excellent corporate-welfare column

What a proposed mall project illustrates about subsidizing developers

By Ryan Chittum   Jun 5, 2012 at 03:08 PM

Reuters's David Cay Johnston has a great column on corporate welfare that mixes reporting and analysis to show why subsidies... More

Audit Notes: seaside villas, paywall past, Citi fraud

By Ryan Chittum   Jun 5, 2012 at 12:30 AM

Line of the day goes to Bloomberg News for this gem from Robert Benmosche, CEO of government-owned AIG (emphasis mine):... More

Bank of America’s Merrill scandal reignites

The NYT reports former CEO Ken Lewis admits shareholders got bad information

By Ryan Chittum   Jun 4, 2012 at 03:00 PM

The New York Times's Gretchen Morgenson has a big story today on how Bank of America fooled shareholders into approving... More

Responding to Shirky on the Washington Post

Transformation is required, and transformation takes investment

By Ryan Chittum   Jun 1, 2012 at 01:31 PM

Thanks to Clay Shirky for responding to my piece on the financialization of the Washington Post Company, which during the... More

Audit Notes: the rise of circulation, LAT’s Facebook trend, mobile ads

By Ryan Chittum   May 31, 2012 at 08:05 PM

This Ken Doctor piece on how circulation is becoming the most-important revenue stream at newspapers is a must-read: Unexpectedly, newspapers... More

Amazon’s California tax squeeze

A WSJ follow story waters down an LAT scoop from two weeks ago

By Ryan Chittum   May 31, 2012 at 11:18 AM

Amazon's long run of not paying collecting state and local sales taxes is coming to an end as legislatures finally... More

Audit Notes: Google’s stonewalling, Moody’s spin clinic, USDA mortgages

An NYT story on how the company tried to stymie investigators of its Street View program

By Ryan Chittum   May 30, 2012 at 09:48 PM

This New York Times story is a few days old, but worth flagging. The paper reports on Google's roguish reaction... More

Audit Notes: Facebook IPO edition

Why the flop matters

By Ryan Chittum   May 30, 2012 at 06:50 AM

Joe Nocera glosses over the problem with Facebook's IPO in arguing that we shouldn't care whether its shares plunged after... More

The private-equity problem with Romney and GS Technologies (UPDATED)

Loading up a company with debt to ensure Bain’s own profits

By Ryan Chittum   May 25, 2012 at 02:26 PM

It's seriously grating to see an Eton and Oxford-educated ambassador's son who works for the Council on Foreign Relations rant... More

Sorkin’s Glass-Steagall straw man

Of course its repeal contributed, directly and indirectly, to the financial crisis

By Ryan Chittum   May 25, 2012 at 06:50 AM

Here's the headline for Andrew Ross Sorkin's column on Tuesday about Glass-Steagall and the financial crisis: Reinstating an Old Rule... More

Audit notes: Buffett on newspapers, Times-Picayune, SEC lets Lehman go

A vow to invest in newspapers and protect them from interference

By Ryan Chittum   May 24, 2012 at 05:59 PM

This is the most hopeful thing I've read about the business of newspapers in a long, long time: I'll quote... More

Audit notes: No more daily in New Orleans, McClatchy, private equity

The NYT reports the Times-Picayune will print two or three times a week

By Ryan Chittum   May 24, 2012 at 12:21 AM

If ever a town needed a newspaper, it's New Orleans. But David Carr reports that Newhouse is preparing big layoffs... More

Facebook fiasco

The well connected made out while retail investors got hosed

By Ryan Chittum   May 23, 2012 at 01:04 PM

We're starting to get a better picture of what happened with Facebook on Friday and in the run-up to its... More

Audit notes: Facebook disclosure, Facebook value, soft corruption

By Ryan Chittum   May 22, 2012 at 05:58 PM

Business Insider's Henry Blodget, who knows a thing or two about analyst/IPO scandals, writes that Facebook and/or its bankers could... More

Audit Notes: Facebook IPO edition

By Ryan Chittum   May 21, 2012 at 05:03 PM

I'm happy to say I was wrong (and Felix was right) in guessing that retail investors would jump into Facebook... More

The Chicago Tribune lights up the flame-retardant industry

An outstanding investigation show how chemical companies preserve a toxic cash cow

By Ryan Chittum   May 21, 2012 at 11:07 AM

A tremendous Chicago Tribune investigation into flame-retardant chemical manufacturers shows how they push their poisons on an unsuspecting public despite... More

A game of telephone fools the Times

And the newspaper-of-record short-arms the correction

By Ryan Chittum   May 18, 2012 at 03:00 PM

The New York Times posts a nasty correction on its Sunday op-ed by William Deresiewicz, who asserted that a study... More

Audit notes: Questions for JPMorgan, hindsight journalism, Ticketmaster

Jesse Eisinger asks what and when Dimon & Co. knew about the bank’s big loss

By Ryan Chittum   May 17, 2012 at 06:11 PM

ProPublica's Jesse Eisinger, in his NYT DealBook column, writes about what the press and the authorities should be asking about... More