McAfee Agrees to Settle and Pay a $50 Million Penalty

Press Release, Sep 13, 2006

 The Securities and Exchange Commission today filed securities fraud charges against McAfee, Inc., formerly known as Network Associates, Inc., a Santa Clara, California-based manufacturer and supplier of computer security and antivirus tools. The Commission's complaint alleges that, from the second quarter of 1998 through 2000, McAfee misled investors when it engaged in a fraudulent scheme to overstate its revenue and earnings by hundreds of millions of dollars. The complaint specifically alleges that, during the period 1998 through 2000, McAfee inflated its cumulative net revenues by $622 million and that, for 1998 alone, McAfee overstated revenues by $562 million, a misstatement of 131 percent. When the scheme began to unravel and McAfee announced, in December 2000, that it would miss its quarterly revenue projection by $190 million, the news slashed over $1 billion from McAfee’s market capitalization.

McAfee consented, without admitting or denying the allegations of the complaint, to the entry of a Court order enjoining it from violating the antifraud, books and records, internal controls, and periodic reporting provisions of the federal securities laws. The order also requires that McAfee pay a $50 million civil penalty, which the Commission will seek to distribute to harmed investors pursuant to the Fair Funds provision of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002. In addition, McAfee has agreed to appoint an independent consultant to examine and recommend improvements to McAfee’s internal accounting controls and revenue recognition and reserves practices to better ensure compliance with the federal securities laws. This proposed settlement is subject to court approval.

“This settlement takes into account both the underlying misconduct and the resulting investor harm, as well as the significant benefit that accrued to McAfee from having artificially inflated the price of its stock and using it to acquire other companies, capitalizing on the artificial value McAfee had created through its fraud,” said Linda Chatman Thomsen, the Director of the SEC’s Division of Enforcement. “The company's channel-stuffing and use of manipulative accounting artifices warrants a severe civil sanction that will act as a deterrent for other public companies and provide a source of funds that can be distributed to injured McAfee investors.” Read more at sec.gov