General Electric to pay $50M in SEC settlement

Business Week reports:

General Electric Co. will pay a $50 million civil penalty to settle charges filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission accusing the conglomerate of improper accounting in order to make its financial results appear more attractive to investors.

The SEC said Tuesday that GE violated U.S. securities laws four times between 2002 and 2003 when accounting for items like commercial paper funding and the sale of train locomotives and aircraft engine spare parts. The SEC said the changes helped GE maintain a string of earnings that beat Wall Street expectations each quarter from 1995 through 2004.

"GE bent the accounting rules beyond the breaking point," said Robert Khuzami, head of the SEC's enforcement division, in a statement.

No word from Chris Matthews on this one.