GE accused of hiding billions in losses in its insurance business

An accountant who gained fame for blowing the whistle on Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme has accused General Electric of hiding nearly $40 billion in losses in its long-term care insurance business. General Electric’s stock plunged more than 11% Thursday after forensic accountant Harry Markopolos released a report accusing the conglomerate of fraud. Markopolos said that the alleged books-cooking was the largest case of accounting fraud he and his team had ever investigated, CNN reported. “In fact, GE’s $38 billion in accounting fraud amounts to over 40% of GE’s market capitalization, making it far more serious than either the Enron or WorldCom accounting frauds,” Markopolos wrote in the report. Enron’s fraud scandal bankrupted the energy company in 2001, while telecom WorldCom was bankrupted in 2002 after its fraud was revealed, CNN reported.