“In Valeant, a financialized age has produced a financialized pharma company,” Jim Grant, legendary contrarian investor, wrote in March of last year. More than a year later, the wider markets are only just beginning to unpick the complicated underpinnings behind Valeant’s stunning run.
As the assumptions bolstering Valeant’s growth story quickly unravel, attention has turned to the company’s deviation from standardized accounting measures known as generally accepted accounting principles, or GAAP. Writing for the New York Times over the weekend, Gretchen Morgenson is the latest in a long line to underscore controversies in Valeant’s accounting methods.
