A bribery scandal involving Mobile TeleSystems apparently cost them around $850 million dollars already, and now the company is facing a class-action lawsuit for not making proper statements regarding that scandal.
According to reports, the company and a subsidiary got caught up in a scheme in Uzbekistan that saw them pay out bribes of roughly $420 million. They then got caught, as the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) started looking into what happened there back in 2014.
At this time, the lawsuit alleges that the company knew that fines were coming, or they at least should have known this was the case. The U.S. government was clearly going to fine them at the end of the investigation.
Even so, instead of being honest about everything that had happened, the company has been accused of making statements that were completely fabricated or that at least misled others about what was happening. They failed to disclose the bribes, the upcoming fines, the investigations and all the rest.
The result of all of this was about $850 million in penalties for criminal actions, paid out to the U.S. government. When you combine that with the $420 million in bribes, a serious amount of money changed hands, all without bring reported accurately. The report also hints that the company did not cooperate properly with the government, which may have played a role here.
When companies are less than honest with investors and others, it is important for those who feel they have been tricked or even lied to directly to know all of the legal options they have.
