Qwest Agrees to Pay $250 Million Fine but Doesn't Admit Guilt!!!

[Orangeman]

The fine was the second-largest ever levied by the SEC for financial reporting fraud.

The Securities and Exchange Commission set the fine, accusing senior managers of directing a scheme to record one-time revenue from the sale of assets as recurring revenue from operations.

In a scathing 56-page complaint, the SEC accused Qwest of a "massive financial fraud" for falsely reporting sales or trades of capacity on its fiber-optic cables as recurring revenue.

It said Qwest was so dependent on the tactic to meet its growth projections that employees compared the company to a drug addict referred to the transactions as Qwest's "heroin."

Here's the rest of the story:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...739EDT0410.DTL

....hmmmm.

I use Qwest for my telephone service. Their billing practices are about as honest as AT&T's used to be....which isn't saying a whole lot...

[Archer]

So buy some shares and play hell and the next share holder meeting

Donna Jaegers, a research analyst with Janco Partners in Denver, said Qwest was expecting worse and had set aside $500 million.

"To the average person on the street, wow, $250 million is huge. To the people who are following it, it's not that much," she said.

Might sweeten the shareholders by sharing the rest out too