& # 39; Not the GE I know & # 39; – board member Seidman responds to Markopolo's & # 39; accusations
Leslie Seidman, director of the General Electric board and chairman of the company's audit committee, told CNBC Thursday that a report from Madoff alert Harry Markopolos accusing GE of fraud is "full of misleading, inaccurate and inflammatory statements."
"This report does not reflect GE as I know," Seidman said of "Closing Bell."
Earlier Thursday, Markopolos released a 175-page report on a website claiming that GE issued false accounts to hide the extent of the problems.
Markopolos called it "a bigger fraud than Enron" after analyzing the company's accounts for the past seven months. He believes GE has a long history of accounting fraud, which is $ 38 billion.
Seidman addressed the allegations of fraud and said: "Fraud is such a strong and inflammatory word that means intention to mislead. This is not GE as I know. We are in full compliance with accounting standards in the United States."
of the areas the report focuses on is GE's long-term insurance unit, where the company had to raise reserves by $ 1[ads1]5 billion last year. Markopolos claims GE is hiding huge losses and has filed false statements to regulators for the device.
In response to this accusation, Seidman said: "As part of our normal operations, we will perform a current loss recognition test in the third quarter, which is a normal part of GAAP accounting. I think we have our arms around the accounts . I think the amount we are providing the reserves for now is reasonable and in accordance with GAAP. "
"I support the financial reporting of this company."
GE CEO Larry Culp also told CNBC that the accusations of Markopolos were false and driven by market manipulation.
Culp also said that Markopolos never spoke to the company's officials before issuing the report, which "shows that he is not interested in accurate economics analysis, but solely to generate downward volatility in the GE stock so that he and his not disclosing hedge fund partners can personally make money. "
As a result of these claims, GE's shares fell more than 11% on Thursday.