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Mohegan Sun Accounting Changed

CONNECTICUT – As reported by the Connecticut Day: "Mohegan Sun's monthly slot machine revenues appear on the company Web site at 8 a.m. on the day slot payments are due to the state.

"Executives discuss and analyze financial results in greater depth in quarterly and annual reports.

"When a casino manager speaks at a financial conference, an outline of the presentation appears online a short time later.

"Mohegan Sun is considered a public company because its owners sold bonds to finance the major expansion that helped turn the casino into a $1 billion-plus business. As such, the casino has to comply with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, a law passed in the wake of corporate scandals like those at Enron and WorldCom. SOXA, as it is called, aims at making companies more accountable and more transparent to investors, and comes with a series of deadlines for compliance.

"…Now the Mohegans have to document their business practices in painstaking detail and share more information with the public than ever before. Sarbanes-Oxley will cost American companies an estimated $5.5 billion this year as they hire staff and purchase software systems to improve internal auditing.

"…At Mohegan Sun, a relatively young company that has grown exponentially over the past few years, executives are looking at SOXA as an opportunity to make their processes as efficient as possible, perhaps even increasing profits.

"The casino created a Corporate Governance Department solely devoted to compliance. Three full-time staff and one part-timer are scrutinizing operations in the casino, food and beverage, hotel and retail divisions. Every significant business process has to be documented, then studied for efficiency and risk…"

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