DOZENS of American companies under investigation over allegations of illegally timing share options to maximise payouts for executives face civil charges from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Christopher Cox, chairman of the SEC, said that the investigations into more than 50 companies accused of improperly timing executive share options were near completion.

In response to questions about the prospect of charges being made in some of the cases, Mr Cox said: “I can only speak to the civil charges for which we are responsible.”

It is not known how many of the companies involved in the investigation will be charged by the SEC, but sources said that the regulator expects to issue civil charges against more than one company within the next week to ten days.

The FBI and Federal prosecutors are also involved in the multifaceted investigations, but it was not clear last night if any criminal charges were being prepared against any of the companies involved.

Mr Cox implied, however, that investigators had uncovered widespread and systematic abuse of stock options grants by a number of companies.

“Each day, of course, we learn more,” Mr Cox said, “but for some time now it has been abundantly clear that these were not episodic instances.”

Some companies involved have already restated financial results because of problems with options grants highlighted during the course of recent investigations.

Federal prosecutors and the SEC are investigating more than 50 US companies that they believe could have backdated options or fraudulently issued options to improperly maximise executive pay.

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