was most disturbing about Enron was that had the firm not been able to pay its bills, its financial practices would have continued. While it is certainly true that auditor/account Arthur Anderson made a number of accounting errors and, at best, took advantage of accounting loopholes to paint a positive portrait of a faltering company, it is equally true that the loopholes that made this possible were readily available to Enron and other companies.
Enron's corporate culture was set by former chairman Kenneth L. Lay and former chief executive Jeffrey K. Skilling, respectively known as Mr. Outside and Mr. Inside (Toobin, 2003). Skilling transformed Enron from a simple natural gas pipeline operation into a futuristic trading enterprise, a company that could, in theory, own nothing but the ability to broker most of the world's energy transactions (Carter, 2002, p. 1). In the process, company executives and their accounti
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