Cell Doors Stay Locked for Adelphia Duo

It looks like the aged founder of Adelphia Communications and his son won’t be getting out of prison for awhile. Their bid for a new trial was rejected on Tuesday by the judge who presided over the one in which they were convicted, the Associated Press reported.Adelphia founder John Rigas and his...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 21, 2007

Guilty Verdict in Fake Filings

A federal jury has found Brian Adley, former chairman and CEO of Chancellor Corp., guilty of securities fraud in a rare trial arising from an SEC complaint.Adley was held liable for fabricating documents and fraudulent accounting from 1998 through 2000 in a scheme to inflate Chancellor’s reported...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 20, 2007

GAO Finds Material Weakness in SEC’s Controls

The Government Accountability Office said Monday that the Securities and Exchange Commission had a material weakness in the internal controls over its financial reporting.The GAO’s report said that data related to accounts receivable balances is processed manually at the SEC in a manner that is p...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 19, 2007

The Fannie Dance

Mortgage lender Fannie Mae arranged a conference call Friday to clarify two accounting issues that affected the company’s income statement. But the analysts on the call seemed more interested in focusing on a single word — “majority” — and its effect on future losses than the columns of numbers t...

By Marie Leone • Nov. 19, 2007

This Case Is Closed, Mac

Another allegation of stock-option backdating has been dismissed, this time by a judge rather than the Securities and Exchange Commission.A shareholder group led by the New York City Employees’ Retirement System had sued Apple Inc., claiming the company had diluted its stock’s value through its a...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 16, 2007

SEC Financial-Reporting Charges Up 59 Percent

The Securities and Exchange Commission brought 59 percent more enforcement actions involving financial disclosure and reporting in fiscal year 2007 than it did last year.The 220 enforcement actions for financial-disclosure missteps is the largest number since at least 2001, far outstripping the 1...

By Sarah Johnson • Nov. 16, 2007

Tyco’s Dynamic Duo Staying Behind Bars

It looks like former Tyco bigwigs Dennis Kozlowski and Mark Swartz will be calling prison home for awhile.A New York State appeals court on Thursday unanimously upheld their convictions for conspiracy, grand larceny, securities fraud, and falsifying business records, according to the Associated P...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 15, 2007

More Backdating Cases Go Poof

VeriSign Inc. said in a regulatory filing Thursday that the Securities and Exchange Commission has dropped an investigation into the company’s historical stock option granting practices without bringing charges. It was the sixth company to make such an announcement since late October. Triquint S...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 15, 2007

SEC Decision Draws Cheers

The Securities and Exchange Commission’s decision to drop reconciliation requirements for international companies filing financial statements in the United States using International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) drew immediate praise from industry groups on Thursday.The U.S. Chamber of Co...

By Alan Rappeport • Nov. 15, 2007

The Dark Side of Global Accounting Standards

If the Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday votes as expected and allows non-U.S. issuers here to report their financials in line with International Financial Reporting Standards without reconciling them with Generally Accepted Accounting Principles, the United States will have crossed ...

By David Katz • Nov. 14, 2007

Forgery, Theft Net 70 Months in Jail

A former finance executive at a small South Carolina company was sentenced to 70 months in prison for stealing $7 million from her former employer. Angela Timmons, who was an account manager and finance director from 1997 through 2006 at Peace Textile, also must transfer to the company personal ...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 14, 2007

Chevron Next to Pay Up in Oil for Food Scheme

Chevron Corp. is the latest company to settle charges that it made illegal payoffs to the former government of Iraq in connection with the United Nations’ Oil for Food Program. To settle civil and criminal charges filed against it by a number of federal agencies, Chevron will pay $30 million, c...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 14, 2007

SEC Enforcement Actions Shoot Up

Increases in backdating and insider-trading cases have kept Securities and Exchange Commission enforcers busier this year. The SEC has filed 14 percent more enforcement cases in its most recent fiscal year, according to Bloomberg. The commission brought 656 cases accusing companies of violating s...

By Sarah Johnson • Nov. 12, 2007

New Trial Date Set for Ex-Symbol CFO

A federal judge has set May 5 as the date for retrial of former Symbol Technologies CFO Kenneth Jaeggi for his alleged role in the company’s massive accounting scandal earlier in the decade.Jaeggi, senior vice president of finance Michael DeGennaro, and senior vice president and general manager ...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 12, 2007

SEC, Former Exec Settle Finite Insurance Charges

The Securities and Exchange Commission and a former senior executive of a RenaissanceRe Holdings subsidiary have settled accounting fraud charges against the executive that stemmed from the finite insurance scandal.Without admitting or denying the commission’s charges, Michael Cash, the former se...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 8, 2007

Fear and Loathing of the SEC

The Securities and Exchange Commission has its sights on possible footholds outside the United States. “London or Brussels have been mentioned as potential overseas offices,” John Nester, an SEC spokesman, told CFO.com. “But we would want to look at Asia as well.”Such plans are still very prelimi...

By Alan Rappeport • Nov. 8, 2007

A Wild Whistle-blower Showdown Is in the Offing

The issue of how poorly Sarbanes-Oxley protects finance executives who blow the whistle on alleged corporate abuse seems headed for a wild showdown in federal court.And when the five-year-old case finally is heard in the Fourth District Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va., it promises to put genera...

By Roy Harris • Nov. 8, 2007

Realtor’s Ex-CFO Charged with $5.4M Embezzlement

Donald Brent Romano, a former CFO of Friedkin Realty Management Group, a privately held real estate company, was slated to face embezzlement-related charges in a federal court on Wednesday. Romano is accused of embezzling $5.4 million from the San Francisco-based firm. An affidavit filed by FBI a...

By Sarah Johnson • Nov. 7, 2007

Enforcement on Backdating Cools Off

Electronic Arts, the video-game creator, announced Tuesday that the Securities and Exchange Commission dropped its probe into the company’s stock-option backdating practices and would not take any action. The halted investigation is the third in the last week, marking a decline in enforcement act...

By Alan Rappeport • Nov. 7, 2007

The SEC’s New Take on Loan Commitments

The Securities and Exchange Commission staff has modified its position on how companies should account for written loan agreements when using the fair-value accounting method. The newly issued opinion follows the recent issuance of new fair-value guidelines that many companies could start using ...

By Sarah Johnson • Nov. 6, 2007

Mesa Air Jettisons CFO After Court Ruling

Mesa Air Group said on Monday that it has fired chief financial officer George “Peter” Murnane III. The move came just days after the U.S. Bankruptcy Court found that Mesa had violated a confidentiality agreement with Hawaiian Airlines.Mesa noted that the court found Murnane had “intentionally a...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 5, 2007

Mesa Air Jettisons CFO After Court Ruling

Mesa Air Group said on Monday that it has fired chief financial officer George “Peter” Murnane III. The move came just days after the U.S. Bankruptcy Court found that Mesa had violated a confidentiality agreement with Hawaiian Airlines.Mesa noted that the court found Murnane had “intentionally a...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 5, 2007

SEC Formalizes Cirrus Logic Scrutiny

Cirrus Logic is now the subject of a full-blown Securities and Exchange Commission investigation, one year after the regulator began an informal inquiry into the company’s historical stock option practices. Under a formal probe, the SEC has subpoena power.Back in March, Cirrus Logic said it expe...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 5, 2007

Backdating Claim Against Openwave to Proceed

A federal judge permitted a shareholder lawsuit to go forward against Openwave Systems and nine former executives in an alleged stock-option backdating scheme. The defendants include two former chief financial officers and two former CEOs. In an opinion dated Oct. 31, U.S. District Judge Denise C...

By Stephen Taub • Nov. 5, 2007

Tales of the Unexpected

As CFO of RWE npower, Volker Beckers is used to discussing risks at the UK energy company during presentations with analysts and investors. After all, in a sector being shaken up by major regulatory upheavals, price volatility and a host of other uncertainties, the company, which is part of Germa...

By Eila Rana • Nov. 5, 2007