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Non-Tech : Auric Goldfinger's Short List -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: StockDung who wrote (11825)	7/6/2003 2:41:27 PM
From: scion	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 19428

SEC launches Cablevision probe By FT.com Staff in New York Published: July 4 2003 0:28 \| Last Updated: July 4 2003 0:28 Cablevision, the New York-based media group, on Thursday said it received formal notice of an investigation and a subpoena from the US Securities and Exchange Commission. The news comes after Cablevision revealed on June 18 accounting irregularities at its cable television subsidiary stretching back more than three years. The company disclosed the news in an SEC filing and said it intended to cooperate fully with investigators. After a five-month internal investigation, the company said employees at its Rainbow Media division had overstated expenses by improperly booking future costs in prior years. After consulting with its auditors, the company concluded the amounts were "insignificant with respect to its previously issued financial statements". Cablevision was the latest company to report what appeared to have been a deliberate understatement of its earnings. Last month, Freddie Mac, the mortgage lender, said it would restate its results to reflect improper accounting of derivatives, which had the effect of depressing its earnings. Cablevision said its investigation had found $6.2m of marketing expenses that should have been booked in 2003 but had been accelerated to 2002. All but $1.7m of that amount was identified and corrected before the company reported its 2002 results in February. Improper accruals in 2000 and 2001 were "similar in size", the company said. As a result of the investigation, 14 employees at Cablevision's AMC movie channel have been sacked. It was unclear why employees would deliberately overstate their expenses, although observers suggested they might have been trying to make their profit targets easier to hit in future years. In 2002, Cablevision reported a loss from continuing operations of $561m on revenues of $4bn. Rainbow reported earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation of $99.4m on revenues of $668.7m. news.ft.com