Toshiba Reports Significant Loss Following Accounting Scandal
Toshiba on Monday posted a net loss of 37.8 billion yen ($316.5 million) for fiscal 2014 after slashing 155.2 billion yen of inflated net profits over a roughly seven-year period of accounting irregularities. The company reported operating profits of 170.4 billion yen for the fiscal year that ended in March, a 33.7-percent decline from the previous year.
Toshiba had forecast 330 billion yen in operating profits before the accounting scandal started to surface in April. But even after corrections for the bloated profits, the decline in the value of its U.S. nuclear power, semiconductor and household electronic businesses, including computers and TVs, led to losses that were much bigger than expected.
Japan's Securities and Exchange Surveillance Commission under the government?s Financial Services Agency will soon be making a full-scale investigation into Toshiba?s books.
The SESC will likely fine Toshiba because its revised balances for fiscal 2011 and 2012, also released on Sept. 7, were significantly lower than what the company had originally reported.
Toshiba plans to hold an shareholders meeting on Sept. 30 to explain the company?s accounting practices and new management policies. The company's new Chief Executive, Masashi Muromachi, promised on Monday to announce a restructuring plan for its semiconductor, PC and TV businesses by the year-end.
The electronics giant acknowledged in July that it had systematically padded its profits for years under the orders of its executives. A third-party panel investigated matter, and the company?s top executives were forced to resign.
Toshiba said it had inflated its operating profits by a total of 224.8 billion yen, or 155.2 billion yen in net profits, between fiscal 2008 and the April-December period of fiscal 2014.