Justice Dept. Ends Apple Backdating Probe; No Charges Filed

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on July 11, 2008 - 9:18am.

Washington - The U.S. Justice Dept. has concluded its criminal investigation into the stock options granting practices of Apple (NASD: AAPL), and will not bring criminal charges against CEO Steve Jobs or any other current or former executives, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Apple admitted that it had "backdated" certain stock options, or changed the date on which they were granted in order to make them more valuable to those to whom they were granted -- but maintained that Jobs was unaware of the accounting implications.

Apple still faces a securities fraud class action lawsuit in relation to its stock options backdating.