Options backdated after 9/11 plunge - Making a profit from 3000 dead people. Real nice

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/306521_stockoptions08.html

Last updated March 7, 2007 6:24 p.m. PT

Options backdated after 9/11 plunge

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Several public companies have acknowledged backdating stock options granted after Sept. 11, 2001, which suggests that some executives may have profited from Wall Street's plunge following the terrorist attacks, The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.

Some companies recently admitted to improperly dating options grants to executives and other employees to make it appear that they were awarded at low points in the companies' stock prices after Sept. 11, The Journal found. It said they were Affiliated Computer Services Inc., Corinthian Colleges Inc., KLA-Tencor Corp., Progress Software Corp. and Take-Two Interactive Software Inc.

Other companies that have acknowledged substantial backdating also granted options dated in the period following 9/11, but haven't said whether those options were backdated, The Journal noted. An analysis by the newspaper published in July showed that, among 1,800 companies, the frequency of options awards more than doubled in late September 2001 during the stock market's low point.

About 130 public companies are under investigation by the Justice Department or the Securities and Exchange Commission in the options scandal, which SEC Chairman Christopher Cox recently described as "a pandemic of crooked accounting."

..........Eight company executives have been criminally charged.

In the scandal, more than $5 billion in company earnings has been erased by restatements and more than 60 senior officers and directors have lost their jobs..........