Posted on 08/19/2010 3:11:09 PM PDT by the invisib1e hand
Federal regulators accused the State of New Jersey of securities fraud on Wednesday for claiming it had been properly funding public workers’ pensions when it was not. The Securities and Exchange Commission said the action was its first ever against a state, and only its second against any government over the handling of a public pension fund. The first was the city of San Diego. More may be in store; the agency announced in January that it had a special unit looking into public pension disclosures. The S.E.C. has been trying to assume more authority over municipal securities. The commission settled its suit with New Jersey by issuing a cease-and-desist order, which the state accepted without admitting or denying the findings. No penalties were imposed. Nor did the S.E.C.’s order name any individual state officials, nor the bond underwriters and other professionals whose job it was to vouch for the state’s financial statements. New Jersey’s largest bond underwriters during the period in question include Citigroup, J. P. Morgan Securities, Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, Merrill Lynch, Goldman Sachs and Barclays Capital. The S.E.C. said its action was meant to dissuade other governments and their advisers from hiding bad fiscal news in a fog of pension numbers. Actuaries, for instance, have been raising questions about the framework Illinois has laid out for bolstering its pension funds...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
The S.E.C. said its action was meant to dissuade other governments and their advisers from hiding bad fiscal news in a fog of pension numbers. Actuaries, for instance, have been raising questions about the framework Illinois has laid out for bolstering its pension funds. In New York, California and other places, financial advisers have told lawmakers that benefits could be sweetened at virtually no cost, only to be proved wrong once those benefits were adopted.
Here's another story on this from Pensions & Investments.
Because a REPUBLICAN, Governor, Christie is leading the state, ALL kinds of corruption will come out and you should INFER it is Christi’s FAULT. The NYT excells at mud slinging.
Obama's all about the unions. screw everyone else.
just f'n perfect.
It’s not just the fault of those who got great pension deals.
It’s the politicians who didn’t fund the pensions, spent that money, AND floated tons of bond issues every year to fund additional projects.
They should have acknowledged they had the pension obligations before spending additional money. That would have controlled the pensions, the spending or both.
A number of states, if not all of them, are in this same boat. Does the choice of state have to be an example have something to do with the electoral choice of the New Jersey citizens?
That was my first thought, but given this...
New Jersey agreed to settle the case without admitting or denying the SEC’s findings. The state consented to a cease-and-desist order, and wasn’t required to pay any civil fines or penalties.
it seems like a non-issue.
And a little bizarre.
The link is for the P&I story, which I seem to have failed to post in #2 above.
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