Cooking The Books

Business, Legal & Accounting Glossary

Definition: Cooking The Books


Cooking The Books


Full Definition of Cooking The Books


Cooking the books is an unethical practice of misrepresenting company’s financial standing. When cooking the books, corporations typically manipulate their accounting records and financial statements. Cooking the books is fraudulent and illegal, and is mainly done for the purpose of inflating profits, achieving preset budgets, and receiving sizeable bonuses. Methods employed for cooking the books are often sophisticated, requiring a deep understanding of financial accounting. Thus, ordinary investors are the ones that suffer the most severe damage from cooking the books. Cooking the books is exemplified by highly publicized bankruptcy cases involving companies like Worldcom, Enron, and Adelphia. However, despite their complexity, there are warning signs that may mark cooking the books. Delaying expenses, accelerating revenues, manipulating acquisition expenses, off-statement liability housing and other similar deceptive practices may all signal cooking the books activity.


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March 29, 2024 https://payrollheaven.com/define/cooking-the-books/.
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https://payrollheaven.com/define/cooking-the-books/ (accessed: March 29, 2024).
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Cooking The Books. PayrollHeaven.com. Retrieved March 29, 2024
, from PayrollHeaven.com website: https://payrollheaven.com/define/cooking-the-books/

Definition Sources


Definitions for Cooking The Books are sourced/syndicated and enhanced from:

  • A Dictionary of Economics (Oxford Quick Reference)
  • Oxford Dictionary Of Accounting
  • Oxford Dictionary Of Business & Management

This glossary post was last updated: 4th February, 2020 | 0 Views.