Freight transportation supply company, The Greenbrier Companies, has agreed to pay $1 million in civil penalties, while its founder and former CEO will pay $100,000 in civil penalties, to settle charges that they failed to disclose perks provided to company executives, the Securities and Exchange Commission announced March 2.
Founder and former CEO William Furman “owned a private aircraft, which he leased to an aircraft management company to charter to third parties on his behalf,” according to the SEC order. During fiscal years 2017 to 2021, Greenbrier paid the management company approximately $3 million to charter Furman’s plane for business-related travel. However, the company did not disclose that Furman received approximately $1.6 million of that amount, the SEC said.
The SEC’s orders also found the company failed to disclose approximately $320,000 in perks provided to Furman and other executives from fiscal years 2017 to 2020, “mostly for travel-related expenses for the executives’ spouses to attend customer and industry receptions, as well as other functions,” the SEC said.
“Public companies are required to disclose their executives’ financial interest in the companies’ transactions and to accurately record executives’ perks so that shareholders can fairly evaluate the compensation paid to those executives,” said Monique Winkler, Director of the SEC’s San Francisco Regional Office. “The SEC will hold companies accountable when they fail to meet their obligations to shareholders so that our markets remain transparent and fair for all.”
The SEC’s orders find that the company and Furman violated negligence-based antifraud and proxy provisions of the federal securities laws and committed or caused “reporting, books and records, and internal accounting controls violations” of federal securities laws. Without admitting or denying the SEC’s findings, Greenbrier and Furman further agreed to cease-and-desist from future violations of the securities laws. 
Jaclyn Jaeger is a contributing editor at Compliance Chief 360° and a freelance business writer based in Manchester, New Hampshire.