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Reader question: Please explain “window dressing” in this headline: “Wall Street banks accused of window dressing debt.” My comments: When banks go window dressing, they, like women applying makeup, try to look better - by fudging figures so that numbers in the account book look better to the public eye. In other words, they are cooking the books. By window dressing debt, they are essentially hiding the debt, temporarily hiding it that is. For example, at the end of each financial quarter, when publicly listed banks have to report their balances (earnings and losses) to the public, they deliberately refrain from mentioning some debts, saving them for mentioning later, say, during the middle of the next quarter when a full set of figures are prepared - this time, though, the figures will not be revealed to the public. At the end of the next quarter, when banks are again required to reveal performance numbers, they again conceal some debt figures from the public view. ANZ.com’s financial dictionary defines “window dressing” thus: Arranging financial details, such as deposits, loans and portfolios, to give the best possible impression for balance-sheet purposes. Anyways, the “window” in “window dressing” refers to the display window of shops and stores. This is the same “window” as in window shopping, when you inspect shop windows to see what’s on display, even though you have no intention (or money) to actually buy anything. | 
