Halliburton fined for false profit statement

[RetroLounge]

Halliburton Co. on Tuesday agreed to pay $7.5 million to settle federal regulators' allegations that it misled investors about the size of its profits for more than a year when Dick Cheney ran the firm before being elected vice president.

Cheney was not a defendant in the case, and in a statement announcing the settlement, the Securities and Exchange Commission said he provided testimony and "cooperated willingly and fully" in the investigation.

SEC officials said the company did not engage in fraud, but failed to tell investors it had made a change in its accounting methods that effectively increased its pretax profits by $128 million in parts of 1998 and 1999.

The new method was allowed under generally accepted accounting principles, but the SEC said Houston-based Halliburton's failure for nearly two years to publicly disclose the change left investors with misleading financial results.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-0408040322aug04,1,722874.story?coll=chi-business-hed

RL

[jeff30997]

1. It's only the tip of the iceberg imo...

[Robb]

2. Not technically fraud, they say...

...but can I start calling Cheney a "false prophet"? :D

[Moderator]

3. Duplicate

Please add this link to the previous thread on this topic:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=727235