One worker, $154 million in damage

The next time you screw something up at work, just think about the Macy’s employee who singlehandedly derailed the department store’s entire quarterly earnings report.

Macy’s announced today that an employee (who is no longer at the company, shocking) concealed $154 million in small package delivery expenses over the past three years.

Despite the fact that the company said there was “no indication” that the erroneous expenses impacted its cash management, Macy’s was forced to delay its third-quarter earnings announcement that was planned for Tuesday. Shares of Macy’s sank 2.27% today.

The earnings disaster comes at an already trying time for Macy’s. Its stock is down over 19% year to date, and while its full earnings report will be delayed, the company released a preliminary earnings report this morning that revealed mixed results.

Net sales slipped 2.4% last quarter, with shoppers opting out of purchasing cold weather apparel given it’s the warmest fall on average. However, sales at luxury brands Bloomingdales and Bluemercury rose 1.4% and 3.2%, respectively, giving shareholders hope of a turnaround ahead.

The accounting error hall of fame

We don’t think we’ve seen one employee weaponize Expensify to quite this extreme before, but there have been some iconic corporate accounting screwups throughout the years that do make the highlight reel:

• We all remember Super Micro’s transformation from AI darling to Magnificent Headache for investors. Why? A short seller revealed a slew of accounting problems back in June, which resulted in a DOJ investigation and the departure of its independent financial auditor.
• Tupperware hoped its sturdy to-go containers could preserve its annual report for later after it lost so much of its accounting staff that it couldn’t file on time back in April.
• In fact, accounting staff attrition was also responsible for reporting problems at Advance Auto Parts, LegalZoom, and biotech Evotec, according to CFO Brew.

Let’s just hope Snoopy has been keeping his financial ducks in a row so at least the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade can go on as planned.—LB