The city of Miami misled investors about its financial health while selling hundreds of millions of dollars worth of bonds, federal regulators charge.
The Security and Exchange Commission said in a letter to the city that it may seeks fines or a court order against the city for violating federal laws,
The Miami Herald reported Tuesday.
The agency conducted a 2 1/2 –year probe into the matter that began in 2009 after the Herald reported city finance officials had shifted $26.4 million from the capital budget into the general fund.
City officials said they would respond that charges are not warranted. Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado expressed relief that the investigation had ended.
“We keep paying for the sins of the past,” Regalado told the Herald “But we have taken many, many measures to avoid anything like this from happening in the future.”
There is still a separate, ongoing SEC investigation into government bonds issued for the Miami Marlins ballpark.
© 2013 Newsmax. All rights reserved.