Stock Options continue to haunt Apple
With the Macworld keynote still on the horizon, the last thing Apple needs is a few more lawsuits and federal investigations.
The San Francisco Chronicle reports that Apple faces a new shareholder lawsuit along with twin investigations by the San Francisco's US Attorney's office and by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Apple's internal investigation, led by movie star, former Veep and all around green guy Al Gore, cleared Steve Jobs and his executive team. Apparently the lawsuit names about a dozen complaints including backdating stock options and "spring loading", where options are granted in advance of releasing news likely to drive up prices. The bottom line is that this controversy looks like it will be around for a while longer. Is there a "there" there? It's hard to tell. We're not lawyers and this whole thing looks like it rests on lots of technicalities.
