Satyam, PwC settle SEC accounting fraud probes

[1]

Satyam Computer Services Ltd and auditor PricewaterhouseCoopers agreed to pay a combined $17.5 million to settle investigations into an accounting fraud that became India's biggest corporate scandal in 2009.

Satyam, an outsourcing company now known as Mahindra Satyam Ltd, will pay $10 million to settle US Securities and Exchange Commission charges it fraudulently inflated revenue, income and cash balances by more than $1 billion over five years.

Separately, India-based affiliates of PwC will pay $6 million to settle related SEC charges and $1.5 million in a settlement with the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board.

The SEC said its settlement with the PwC affiliates is its largest involving a foreign-based accounting firm and the PCAOB said its accord is its largest civil money penalty ever.