Monday, April 2, 2012

Overstock.com Dodges SEC Investigation

Salt Lake City-based Overstock.com said this morning that the Securities and Exchange Commission has decided not to take any action in an investigation kicked off in 2009. Overstock.com said it was notified by letter that the SEC's Salt Lake Regional Office closed its 2009 investigation of Overstock.com, and does not intend to recommend to the Commission any enforcement action against the company. The SEC had begun looking into the firm over restatements of certain of its financial statements in 2006 and 2008, involving how the firm was accounting for customer refunds and credits. Those matters came up in public sparring between the firm and its former auditors, Grant Thornton, which had resulted in Overstock.com firing Grant Thornton as its auditor in 2009.