The $ 100 million fine is the largest he has ever had against an audit firm. “This action violates the trust of the janitors within the janitor who has been assigned to control many of our nation’s public companies,” Gurbir Grewal, director of the SEC Enforcement Department, told a news release. “It is simply outrageous that the professionals themselves who are responsible for cheating on customers have cheated on ethics tests for all things.” He added that it was “equally shocking” that his research was blocked. “This should serve as a clear signal that the SEC will not tolerate integrity failures by independent auditors who choose the easiest mistake over the hardest right,” Grewal said. In addition to the fine, the SEC ordered Ernst & Young to retain two independent advisers to “help rectify its shortcomings,” with one company reviewing the company’s ethics procedures and another reviewing disclosure failures. Ernst & Young said in a statement that “nothing is more important than our integrity and our ethics” and that it complied with the SEC’s mandate. “We have repeatedly and consistently taken steps to enhance the culture of compliance, ethics and integrity in the past,” a company spokesman said. “We will continue to take extensive action, including disciplinary action, training, monitoring and communications, to further strengthen our commitment in the future.” The fine is twice what KPMG was ordered to pay in 2019 for similar fraud charges.
