It doesn't get any better than this when it comes to trying to find out what a company may or may not be hiding in its books. I'm speaking, of course, of the August 14 deadline that CEOs and CFOs have to respond to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's Order 4-460; the executives must certify, under oath, the accuracy of their company's most recent financial statements--their June quarter 10-Qs. The order applies to the 947 public companies with revenue of more than $1.2 billion in their last fiscal year. You can bet your boots that we ain't going to go 947 for 947 in the thumbs-up category.

Actually, in the spirit of being forthcoming, I will point out that executives at one of Red Herring's favorite whipping boys, Qwest Communications, have already come out and said they're not going to put their John Hancocks on that piece of paper by next week's deadline. But I stand by my bet: we're not going to go 946 for 947 either. Anyone who would like to take me up on that bet is welcome--I will offer attractive odds.

Because this is all about transparency, the SEC is doing us the favor of keeping track of those companies that have submitted their statements, as well as those that pass muster--i.e., those that didn't have the foolish inclination to look for wiggle room in response to a simple question: are your financials correct or not? You can find the list at www.sec.gov/rules/extra/ceocfo.htm. There will be quite a bit of action on that site in the week ahead.

Some companies have already submitted their statements. Most interesting at the end of last week was Electronic Data Systems, which has found itself the subject of many an accounting rumor lately. The commission hasn't evaluated EDS's statement yet, but it's probably a good sign that the company stepped up to the plate so quickly. Others getting a jump on their filing: Amazon.com, Corning, Fiserv, Oracle, Texas Instruments, and Qualcomm. The only problem with this list is that, except for EDS, none of the companies on it have had much in the way of accounting issues lately. In this case, no news is no news.

What is there to look for in the filings? Nothing except for the filing itself. In other words, all you want to see is those signatures saying that the executives are on board with their numbers (and, presumably, that they anticipate a clean bill of health from the SEC). It will therefore be interesting to watch for the submissions of certain companies that have been under fire of late, names like AOL Time Warner, Computer Associates, General Electric, IBM, and Xerox. (I was saddened to see that Global Crossing didn't pass the revenue threshold to make the list. That would have been amusing.) While it's difficult to see why a stock should garner interest just because the company's executives assert that they're playing fair, I wouldn't be surprised if some of the above got a near-term boost once (er, if) they file.

Or, as Louise Purtle, an analyst at the independent research firm CreditSights, wrote last week: "The SEC appears determined to make it clear that unless the CEO personally guarantees that there is no smoke, then we can all assume there is fire." It's been a dry summer. A stock could burn quite brightly.