A few years ago, Kellogg, a maker of cereals and foods, hit its targeted earnings-per-share growth of 11 percent, and its stock price was up 25 percent. In the fourth quarter of that year, the company took a significant "one-time" charge against earnings when it wrote down assets-mostly property, plant, and equipment-from its overseas operations. Interestingly, this write-down was the ninth such charge in the past 11 quarters. Some analysts believe that Kellogg was using these charges to manage earnings and estimated that the company's earnings should actually have been 24 percent below the previous year.