Nortel has agreed to pay $35m in damages to shareholders hurt by the company's fraudulent accounting practises.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) accused Nortel of falsely inflating revenues between 2000 and 2003 in order to ensure the company hit Wall Street targets.

After the SEC filed civil fraud charges against Nortel yesterday the company agreed to settle. According to a statement on the SEC website: "Nortel has agreed to settle the commission's action by consenting to be permanently enjoined from violating the anti-fraud, reporting, books and records and internal control provisions of the federal securities laws and by paying a $35m civil penalty,"

The company also agrees to meet regulators every quarter to update them on progress. The statement continues: "As part of the settlement, Nortel agrees to report to the commission staff every quarter until it fully implements its remediation programme, and the company and its outside auditor agree that the existing material weakness has been resolved."

The SEC statement is here. ®

Related stories

• Nortel CEO says g'bye as revenues rise (10 August 2009)
• Nortel UK goes into administration to save itself (15 January 2009)
• Nortel begs for bankruptcy protection (14 January 2009)
• Nortel shares sink on titsup fears (11 December 2008)
• Nortel losses $3.4bn in Q3 (10 November 2008)
• Nortel forced to reforecast, put unit on block (17 September 2008)
• Nortel widens telecom tubes with 40Gb/s optical cards (13 March 2008)
• Nortel shrinks loss (7 November 2006)
• Comment Nortel not the only winner at Telus IPTV deal (24 September 2006)
• Nortel in SMB reseller draft (12 September 2006)
• Microsoft and Nortel unite on communications (18 July 2006)
• Nortel to axe 1,100 jobs (27 June 2006)
• Comment Nortel weakened by failure of Huawei venture (16 June 2006)
• UPC picks Nortel for VoIP (19 April 2006)
• Nortel listens when the Tasman is testifying (28 December 2005)