Insights into the SEC's Accounting Quality Model

An Interview with Craig M. Lewis

Douglas M. Boyle, DBA, CPA, CMA, and James F. Boyle, CPA, and Brian W. Carpenter, PhD

In BriefThe SEC's most notable initiative in applying technology to solve the problem of detecting fraud has been its accounting quality model (AQM). The program's goal is to efficiently identify companies that represent a high risk for fraud as well as the potentially fraudulent items in their reporting. The AQM was spearheaded by Craig M. Lewis, former director and chief economist of the SEC's Division of Economic and Risk Analysis. This article introduces the AQM and features an interview with Lewis himself, in which he discusses the project's merits, its limitations, and its common criticisms, as well as touching upon the SEC's broader role in finding fraud.