HP Takes an Earnings Hit to Make DOJ Go Away
When Hewlett-Packard reports third-quarter earnings, they’ll likely be two cents lighter than they would have been otherwise, thanks to the settlement of a long-running U.S. Department of Justice probe.
After market close Monday, HP (HPQ) said it had tentatively settled a DOJ investigation into its handling of government contracts. Should it be approved, HP will have resolved, without admitting wrongdoing, allegations that it paid millions of dollars in kickbacks or “influencer fees” to systems integrators for preferential treatment on government contracts they were working on, though it had reasonable grounds to believe doing so was illegal.