For Immediate Release
Friday, April 15, 2005
AFSCME Pension Plan Urges The SEC To Insist On Full Disclosure Relief At AIG
Washington —The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Pension Plan (the Plan) today urged the Securities and Exchange Commission not to grant relief to the American International Group Inc. (AIG) if it seeks to use Form S-3, commonly referred to as shelf registration, to register new securities.
In light of the recent financial scandal and the delay in filing its 10-K disclosure, Gerald W. McEntee the AFSCME Pension Plan chairman sent a letter to Alan Beller director, Division of Corporation Finance at the SEC, urging them to require AIG to use the longer, more complete disclosures in Form S-1 and not the abbreviated shelf registration filing.
The letter states, In light of AIGs admitted past disclosure deficiencies, it is particularly important for purchasers of securities offered by AIG in any offering in the next year to have the more complete disclosure provided pursuant to Form S-1. ... Due diligence takes on heightened importance with respect to AIG because of the fluid nature of the situation and the possibility that more improper accounting or other problems will be uncovered in the course of AIGs own investigation or those being conducted by regulators.
The company has lost more than 28 percent of its value in the past two months, and has already missed its required annual filing deadline twice, said McEntee. Shareholders deserve as complete a disclosure as possible in the forthcoming period. AIG needs to be as transparent as possible.
AIG had announced that the filing of its 2004 Form 10-K would be delayed beyond the March 31, 2005, extended due date because the company is continuing to review its accounting treatment of certain items, including transactions that are the subject of investigations by the Commission and the Office of the Attorney General for the state of New York. With limited exceptions, a registrants failure to file in a timely manner any periodic report, including a Form 10-K, makes the registrant ineligible to use Form S-3 to register securities for a period of one year after the due date for the report.
The AFSCME Employees Pension Plan, with $700 million in assets owns 26,965 shares of AIG.
- Letter from AFSCME Employees Pension Plan to SEC about AIG
