Qwest Financial Fraud Essay
Financial Fraud- Qwest Communications
Introduction
In the late 90’s, early 2000’s, Qwest Communications International Inc. (Qwest) was a rapidly growing telecommunications company that provided global internet and telephone services. At their pinnacle, Qwest was one of their industry’s top leaders, reporting revenues of $16.7 billion in 2001 (Anonymous, 2013). Through continued expansion and acquisitions of other large telecommunications companies, it seemed things were only headed in a positive direction for Qwest. Their technology and advancement were consistently outpacing the competition, and they were dominating the marketplace. Then things took a turn for the worse in 2002, with the discovery that the President and CEO, in conjunction with several other top executives, were committing several types of financial fraud, including insider trading. Unraveling the web of lies and deceit uncovered billions of dollars of falsely reported revenue, and ultimately led to the tarnished brand image of Qwest, millions of dollars lost by investors and hundreds of employee out of work.
According to sources, Qwest began in 1988 as SP Telecom, a subsidiary of Southern Pacific Transportation Co. located in San Francisco, California. Southern Pacific Transportation was purchased and owned by billionaire oil …show more content…
(Vuong, 2011) The once iconic symbol that helped perpetuate the image of Denver’s growth and success is now just a piece of CenturyLink, a company based out of Monroe, Louisiana. The ex -“Qwest Tower”, is located at 1801 California Street, and remains Denver’s second tallest skyscraper, standing at 709 feet or 52 floors (The Denver Post, 2014). Many Denver locals and visitors knew this prominent building as the “Qwest Tower” thanks to its size and the massive Qwest logo displayed across the top. Today, it instead reads Century Link and is emblazoned with their large, glowing green
Introduction
In the late 90’s, early 2000’s, Qwest Communications International Inc. (Qwest) was a rapidly growing telecommunications company that provided global internet and telephone services. At their pinnacle, Qwest was one of their industry’s top leaders, reporting revenues of $16.7 billion in 2001 (Anonymous, 2013). Through continued expansion and acquisitions of other large telecommunications companies, it seemed things were only headed in a positive direction for Qwest. Their technology and advancement were consistently outpacing the competition, and they were dominating the marketplace. Then things took a turn for the worse in 2002, with the discovery that the President and CEO, in conjunction with several other top executives, were committing several types of financial fraud, including insider trading. Unraveling the web of lies and deceit uncovered billions of dollars of falsely reported revenue, and ultimately led to the tarnished brand image of Qwest, millions of dollars lost by investors and hundreds of employee out of work.
According to sources, Qwest began in 1988 as SP Telecom, a subsidiary of Southern Pacific Transportation Co. located in San Francisco, California. Southern Pacific Transportation was purchased and owned by billionaire oil …show more content…
(Vuong, 2011) The once iconic symbol that helped perpetuate the image of Denver’s growth and success is now just a piece of CenturyLink, a company based out of Monroe, Louisiana. The ex -“Qwest Tower”, is located at 1801 California Street, and remains Denver’s second tallest skyscraper, standing at 709 feet or 52 floors (The Denver Post, 2014). Many Denver locals and visitors knew this prominent building as the “Qwest Tower” thanks to its size and the massive Qwest logo displayed across the top. Today, it instead reads Century Link and is emblazoned with their large, glowing green