Source Economic Daily

Author Zeng Jinhua

The original title "cracking down on financial fraud must be" tusk with thorns ""

Recently, the draft amendment to the Accounting Law was submitted to the Ninth meeting of the standing Committee of the 14th National people's Congress for consideration for the first time. Among them, the most concerned change is to greatly increase the punishment standard of accounting violations and strengthen the investigation of legal responsibility for financial fraud.

Financial fraud does great harm, and the public hates it, which can be described as "everyone shouting and beating". In the regulatory crackdown on financial fraud, the "100000 yuan" fine has always been a controversial topic. Take the administrative penalty imposed by the Ministry of Finance on Deloitte and Huarong in March last year as an example, although there have been problems such as failure of internal control and risk control and serious distortion of accounting information over the years, Huarong and its seven related companies received only a fine of only 100000 yuan. In its circular, the Ministry of Finance specifically stated that "the above penalties are the top penalties imposed in accordance with Article 43 of the Accounting Law of the people's Republic of China."

The current accounting law was mainly revised in 1999 and has been in force for more than 20 years.Cubecrash2With major changes, some regulations lag behind, making it difficult to meet the needs of economic and social development and the reform of the accounting industry. Especially in the aspect of legal liability, the punishment for accounting illegal acts is light and soft. In accordance with regulations, whoever forges or alters accounting vouchers or account books and compiles false financial and accounting reports may concurrently impose a fine of not less than 5,000 yuan and not more than 100,000 yuan on the unit, and the person-in-charge and other persons directly responsible for it may be fined not less than 3,000 yuan but not more than 50,000 yuan. Compared with the illegal scale or illegal income of tens of millions of yuan or hundreds of millions of yuan of financial fraud, the illegal cost is so low that the legal deterrent is difficult to reflect. In recent years, corporate financial fraud has been banned repeatedly, especially major financial fraud cases occur frequently in the capital market, one of the important reasons is that the punishment did not really achieve "long teeth with thorns", and many penalties make people feel like "drizzle" and "tickling".

To crack down on financial fraud, we must have "long teeth with thorns" and angles, and the law needs to be revised and perfected with the times, so as to provide a more powerful legal guarantee for curbing accounting violations. The draft amendment to the Accounting Law increases the amount of fines for financial fraud and punishes them on the basis of illegal gains, clearly stipulating that "if the illegal gains are more than 200000 yuan, the unit may be fined not less than one time and not more than ten times the illegal gains. If there are no illegal gains or the illegal proceeds are less than 200000 yuan, a fine of not less than 200000 yuan and not more than 2 million yuan may be imposed concurrently." Only by greatly raising the punishment standard of accounting violations and increasing the investigation of legal responsibility, so that the illegal costs are far greater than the illegal benefits, financial fraudsters can have a "sense of pain", so as to achieve the deterrent effect of the law.

Accounting violations will cause economic losses to investors and other related parties. While implementing administrative penalties for financial fraud, it is also necessary to investigate civil liability. From the perspective of the accounting legal system of developed economies, in addition to the strict administrative liability and criminal liability, the provisions of civil liability for accounting violations are also very prominent. By perfecting the legal liability system and clarifying the civil liability of financial fraudsters, it is helpful to increase the illegal cost, make up for the economic losses of the victims and safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of the victims.

The legal liability provisions of the accounting law should be clearly defined and highly operational, so as to prevent the legal liability from falling to the ground. In particular, the legal responsibilities of accounting actors such as the person in charge of units, accounting institutions and general accounting personnel for all kinds of accounting violations should be clearly defined respectively. At the same time, it is necessary to coordinate and link up with the company law, securities law, criminal law, certified public accountant law and other legal provisions to crack down on accounting violations and curb financial fraud.

The law is not enough to act on your own. "long teeth with thorns" should not only stay in the legal provisions, but should also be fully reflected in supervision and law enforcement. It is necessary to enrich regulatory means, strictly enforce law enforcement procedures, and fully implement the provisions of legal liability, so that financial fraudsters have nothing to hide and pay a heavy price.

"No false accounting", although there are only four simple words, it is easier to know than to do. To solve the problems of accounting data distortion and financial fraud is a complex system engineering. In addition to improving laws and regulations, increasing penalties, and promoting development with good laws, we also need to improve the efficiency of financial and accounting supervision and promote the construction of integrity in the industry. Only by enhancing the authenticity and reliability of accounting information can we give full play to the important function of accounting in economic management and promote the healthy and orderly development of market economy.

Executive producer / Deming

Audit / Wang Yue

Editor / Liu Li