Big Buyback Ends Kerr-McGee Proxy Fight

Kerr-McGee Corp. announced that it will buy back $4 billion of stock as part of an agreement to end a proxy fight with Carl Icahn and activist hedge fund JANA Partners LLC. The company also agreed to cut its dividend and sell some “shorter-life properties” in the Gulf of Mexico, the United States...

By Stephen Taub • April 15, 2005

Good Week/Bad Week: What’s the Frequency, Kenneth?

Disclaimer: While the entries in GW/BW are based on actual news items, some of the people, quotes, and hat sizes in this article are fictional. Other stuff I just plain made up.Please, no lawsuits.GOOD WEEK:1. Kenneth LayIn a filing Wednesday, attorneys for the Enron founder argued against the su...

By John Goff • April 15, 2005

Finite Insurance: Beyond the Scandals

Not very long ago, the use of finite insurance looked much better than it looks today.For years before the current scandals at American International Group Inc., the arrangements were touted as a sleek way for a corporation to control its risk funding and shed liabilities from its balance sheet. ...

By David Katz • April 14, 2005

What’s Next for Section 404?

Will Section 404 be scaled back?Two of the most powerful securities regulators seemed to hint as much at yesterday’s Securities and Exchange Commission roundtable, which discussed the demands of that Sarbanes-Oxley provision calling for companies to document their internal controls over financial...

By Stephen Taub • April 14, 2005

Greenberg Shifts $2.2B of Shares to Wife

Former American International Group Inc. chairman and chief executive officer Maurice “Hank” Greenberg transferred ownership of 41.4 million shares of the insurance company to his wife, Corinne P. Greenberg, according to a regulatory filing.The transfer, made four days before Greenberg’s ouster a...

By Stephen Taub • April 13, 2005

Specialists Charged with Illegal Trading

Federal authorities indicted 15 New York Stock Exchange specialists for using their inside positions to illegally earn about $20 million for themselves, reported the Associated Press.U.S. Attorney David Kelley asserted at a press conference that the 15 specialists at five firms cheated the market...

By Stephen Taub • April 13, 2005

SEC’s Goldschmid Revives Proxy Access

Harvey Goldschmid, one of the SEC’s two Democratic commissioners, seems determined that the Securities and Exchange Commission pass some form of proxy access rule before he steps down later this year.During a speech yesterday to the Council of Institutional Investors, according to Dow Jones, Gold...

By Stephen Taub • April 12, 2005

Spitzer on AIG: We Call It ”Fraud”

New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer has turned up the heat on American International Group and its former chairman Maurice “Hank” Greenberg.Speaking on the Sunday television show “This Week,” Spitzer accused the executive who had built the largest insurance company of committing fraud. “That ...

By Stephen Taub • April 11, 2005

The Limits of Mercy

What happened to the kinder, gentler Securities and Exchange Commission? Less than four years ago, then-chairman Harvey Pitt wanted an agency that favored cooperation over confrontation. The SEC seemed headed in a business-friendlier direction, and critics feared that the agency would grow softer...

By Tim Reason • April 11, 2005

Insurance Broker Reaches $51M Settlement

Willis North America Inc. agreed to pay $51 million and end the use of contingent commissions as part of a deal to end investigations by the attorneys general of New York and Minnesota.Willis stressed that it is the only insurance broker to resolve these matters without the New York Attorney Gene...

By Stephen Taub • April 11, 2005

Ford To Issue Climate-Change Report

Activist stockowners have struck again.Yielding to a shareholder resolution filed by environmentally-focused investors, management at Ford Motor Co. indicated that it would issue a report on climate change by the end of the year. The report will examine the business implications of greenhouse gas...

By Stephen Taub • April 4, 2005

AIG: Papers May Have Been Swiped

The troubles continue at American International Group Inc. On Sunday, AIG president and chief executive officer Martin J. Sullivan sent a letter to shareholders, assuring them that AIG’s “unique global franchise is sound, our financial position is solid, and cash flow remains strong.”In the lette...

By Stephen Taub • April 4, 2005

Who’ll Stop the Rain?

Terrorists and hackers may spook corporate managers, but the forces of nature remain the biggest threat to the daily operations of most companies. It didn’t take much besides fallen trees, after all, to knock out electrical power throughout the Northeast two summers ago.To ensure that such an out...

By John Goff • April 1, 2005

A License to Print Money?

Are financial printers consistently exceeding the initial estimates they give clients? The answer seems to be yes — particularly for such transactions as initial public offerings, mergers, or debt offerings.Consider a few examples. When Alibris, an Emeryville, Calif.-based online bookseller, file...

By Don Durfee • April 1, 2005

AIG: Just Subtract $1.7 Billion

American International Group, Inc., whose accounting practices are being scrutinized by regulators, said it may reduce its shareholders equity by nearly $1.7 billion. The reason? Errors and changes in AIG’s accounting estimates and classifications.The embattled insurance giant also said that docu...

By Stephen Taub • March 31, 2005

AIG No Longer AAA Member

American International Group was booted from a very elite group Thursday when Standard & Poor’s lowered the insurance giant’s senior debt ratings to AA-plus, down from AAA.AIG had enjoyed its AAA rating for 22 years and had been just one of eight US companies to hold the top rating from both ...

By Stephen Taub • March 31, 2005

Buying Bias Coverage: Risk Doesn’t Discriminate

In 1999, Nicholas Koutrakos made a decision that may have seemed out of step with his peers. At the suggestion of his company’s insurance carrier, the CFO and co-owner of Call 4 Health/Health Care Answering Services expanded the company’s workers’ compensation policy to include employment practic...

By Marie Leone • March 31, 2005

Return to Vendor: SEC Boosts Saks Probe

The Securities and Exchange Commission has upgraded its informal probe of Saks Inc. to a formal order of private investigation, according to the retailer.The inquiry relates to alleged improper collections of vendor markdown allowances in one of Saks Fifth Avenue’s six merchandising divisions. In...

By Stephen Taub • March 30, 2005

Demand for Greenberg’s Cooperation Seen

The noose is apparently tightening around American International Group and its chairman, Maurice Greenberg.Bloomberg reports that the embattled executive, who already resigned as chief executive officer, will be asked to leave if he doesn’t cooperate with investigations into the insurer’s account...

By Stephen Taub • March 28, 2005

SEC Hits Flowserve with Reg FD Charges

The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged Flowserve Corp. with violations of Reg FD, alleging that the company’s chief executive officer, C. Scott Greer., and its director of investor relations, Michael Conley, caused the breaches.The case against the oil patch precision-equipment maker ...

By Stephen Taub • March 25, 2005

Smaller than a Sarbox?

Sometimes the difference between a big company and a small one can be revealed in the simplest of acts, like writing a check.Take Socket Communications, a publicly traded company that took in $26 million in revenues last year. At Socket, management has an uncomplicated way to make sure its payout...

By David Katz • March 24, 2005

Where Does the Money Go?

See the Spend Management Buyer’s GuideIt’s been a bumpy ride for the software category known variously as spend management, supply management, sourcing management, supplier-relationship management, total-cost management, spend analysis, and, from way back (circa 2000), E-procurement. That so many...

By Connie Winkler • March 22, 2005

Five Dozen Companies Seek Filing Delay

At least 60 companies last week sought an extra 15 days to file their 2004 annual reports, which were due on March 17, according to a CFO.com search of press releases and other public reports.Many of these companies cited issues related to documenting their internal controls as required by Sectio...

By Stephen Taub • March 21, 2005

SEC Names Monitor for CA

The Securities and Exchange Commission named Lee S. Richards as independent examiner for Computer Associates International Inc.Under last fall’s settlement agreement between the Islandia, New York-based software company and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York, governme...

By Stephen Taub • March 21, 2005

Law Professors Back SEC on Reg FD

Regulation Fair Disclosure, the Securities and Exchange Commission’s four-year-old effort to standardize the flow of corporate information to all interested parties, were scheduled to face an unusual challenge yesterday when Siebel Systems challenged the constitutionality of the rule during argum...

By Stephen Taub • March 16, 2005