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Financial Forensics: The Due Diligence Files

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by Sergio Stieben

308 episodes

Updated Daily

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Podcast Overview

Forensic dissection of capital markets collapses. Not headlines — mechanisms. How money moved. Where structures broke. T1 — Full autopsy. The collapse, the actors, the moment nobody stopped it. T2 — GP/LP room. 3 red flags in the documents. Due diligence questions. Active parallels in deals running today. For allocators, GPs, and fund professionals. Hosted by Sergio Stieben — 15 years in GP/LP relations, cross-border finance US-LatAm-Europe. Try FFL Trial, free — run a deal through the same engine, scored against 140 documented collapses: https://risk-pattern-scan.lovable.app

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Publishing Since

4/20/2026

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Recent Episodes

July 20, 2026

Autonomy HP 2012 : Certified Financials Reliance & Audit Quality Due Diligence│File 154 T2

In a nine-figure acquisition, if the target's own auditor has certified its numbers for years, what exactly is the deal team independently verifying versus agreeing to trust a second time? This GP and LP institutional analysis deconstructs the structural reliance on certified financial statements during corporate acquisitions. We contrast Autonomy's target accounting failure with the FIFA jurisdictional gap, isolating how a target’s long-standing, highly concentrated local audit relationship can stop functioning as an independent check and turn into a structural diligence vulnerability. We deliver an active M&A due diligence framework for corporate development teams, private equity sponsors, and investment committees. First, we independently rebuild revenue by product line to isolate hardware loss-leaders from core software margins. Second, we audit reseller channel concentration and quarter-end revenue recognition footnotes. Third, we map target-auditor tenure and regional office fee concentration to trigger forensic Quality of Earnings reviews before binding offers go out.🔴 Every corporate failure leaves behind a pattern — and every good decision leaves one too.This episode is part of Financial Forensics Labs — two shows, one forensic methodology: The Due Diligence Files traces how institutions collapse, The Signal Files traces how the good calls get made. Built from primary-record research by a 15-year capital markets professional.Get to know the framework, the other show, and the tools built from it — all in one place.<a href="https://risk-pattern-scan.lovable.app/">⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Explore Financial Forensics Labs →⁠</a>M&A financial statement due diligence, Quality of Earnings vs audit opinion, target company auditor independence risk, regional audit office client concentration, channel stuffing reseller revenue recognition, gross margin volatility software hardware, forensic accounting M&A screening models, corporate development risk management framework, private equity investment committee diligence, acquisition revenue quality verification, cross-border M&A legal evidentiary standards, post-merger integration write-down prevention, Live Deal Screen M&A audit tools, transaction forensic reconstruction methods Financial Forensics Labs — Every collapse has a pattern. We dissect it.

July 20, 2026

HP & Autonomy 2012 : The $8.8B Write-Down & Dual Standard Autopsy│File 154 T1

Eleven point one billion dollars changed hands for an enterprise software company, yet a massive share of its reported revenue was computer hardware sold at a loss and booked under a software license label. Thirteen months after the deal closed, Hewlett-Packard wrote off eight point eight billion dollars of what it had just paid. This financial forensics autopsy dissects HP's disastrous 2011 acquisition of Autonomy. We trace the mechanical failure of M&A due diligence under compressed deal timelines. Discover how hardware loss-leaders, quarter-end channel stuffing through value-added resellers, and a long-standing auditor relationship passed undetected through HP's deal team. We examine the unique legal aftermath: a convicted CFO, a complete criminal acquittal of CEO Mike Lynch in a US federal court, and a UK civil court finding of liability on the exact same underlying transactions—demonstrating how different evidentiary standards shape corporate accountability. 🔴 Every corporate failure leaves behind a pattern — and every good decision leaves one too.This episode is part of Financial Forensics Labs — two shows, one forensic methodology: The Due Diligence Files traces how institutions collapse, The Signal Files traces how the good calls get made. Built from primary-record research by a 15-year capital markets professional.Get to know the framework, the other show, and the tools built from it — all in one place.<a href="https://risk-pattern-scan.lovable.app/">⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Explore Financial Forensics Labs →⁠</a>HP Autonomy acquisition failure, $8.8 billion impairment write-down, enterprise software revenue recognition fraud, hardware loss leader software reclassification, value-added reseller channel stuffing, compressed M&A due diligence failure, Mike Lynch San Francisco acquittal trial, UK civil fraud verdict damages, auditor independence firm concentration risk, Quality of Earnings M&A red flags, enterprise valuation software multiples, post-acquisition forensic accounting investigation, Leo Apotheker Meg Whitman M&A strategy, cross-border corporate governance litigationFinancial Forensics Labs — Every collapse has a pattern. We dissect it.

July 13, 2026

FIFA 2015: Inside the $150M Private Sports Bribery Architecture│File 153 T1

The police did not wait for room service. They walked into a five-star hotel on the edge of a Swiss lake before sunrise, led six men out through a side entrance, and dismantled a 24-year private bribery economy worth well over one hundred fifty million dollars. This financial autopsy deconstructs the structural capture of soccer's global governing body. We trace the mechanical pattern of how officials elected to run FIFA turned broadcasting rights, sponsorship contracts, and World Cup hosting votes into personal clearinghouses. The analysis isolates the complete absence of outside board seats or public market pricing, creating a self-governing loophole where the only people watching the officials were the other officials. Explore the breakdown of internal oversight, including the famous $10M South Africa World Cup grant discrepancy, and discover how a domestic American tax case unraveled a captured institutional system that national regulators could never touch. 🔴 Every corporate failure leaves behind a pattern.FFL Tools runs a live deal through the same forensic questions behind every case in this feed — 11 dimensions, 55 questions, calibrated to Real Estate, PE, Private Credit or VC — and returns a full Investment Committee Memo, scored against 140 documented collapses.Try it free first: FFL Trial runs the same engine on 20 sample cases, right in your browser. No account, no card.Runs offline. No cloud. Nothing leaves your machine.<a href="https://risk-pattern-scan.lovable.app/">⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Try FFL Trial, free →⁠⁠</a> Financial Forensics Labs — Every collapse has a pattern. We dissect it. FIFA 2015 corruption financial autopsy, sports marketing broadcast rights bribery, CONCACAF executive committee revenue capture, South Africa World Cup host vote scandal, private sports federation governance failures, media rights contract kickbacks architecture, forensic auditing whistleblowers internal reviews, self governing international non profit organizations, corporate board risk leadership blindspots, Swiss law private association vulnerabilities, financial forensic analysis asset diversion, sports sponsorship governance red flags, unsealed racketeering indictments sports executives, institutional fiduciary duty systemic fraudDESCRIPCIÓN SEOKEYWORDS

308 total episodes available

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What is Financial Forensics: The Due Diligence Files?: Forensic dissection of capital markets collapses. Not headlines — mechanisms. How money moved. Where structures broke.

T1 — Full autopsy. The collapse, the actors, the moment nobody stopped it. T2 — GP/LP room. 3 red flags in the documents. Due diligence questions. Active parallels in deals running today. For allocators, GPs, and fund professionals.

Hosted by Sergio Stieben — 15 years in GP/LP relations, cross-border finance US-LatAm-Europe.

Try FFL Trial, free — run a deal through the same engine, scored against 140 documented collapses:

https://risk-pattern-scan.lovable.app
How often does this podcast release new episodes?: This podcast updates daily.
Where can I listen to this podcast?: This podcast is available on 4 platforms including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and more. You can also use the RSS feed directly.
Does this podcast accept guests?: Information about guest appearances is not available.

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