
Trading of Celadon stock has been suspended within the New York Stock Exchange as the trucking company works to identify and remedy accounting errors reaching as far back as 2014.
The NYSE suspended trading of Celadon stock and introduced a movement that would remove the company’s stock listing on Tuesday, April 3rd, after Celadon admitted that an internal investigation revealed accounting errors within the company that could force them to restate their financial results from 2014 through 2017, making it impossible to resolve these issues by the deadline on May 2nd, reported the Wall Street Journal.
Celadon stock closed at $3.45 per share on Monday, prior to the trade suspension, a massive drop from the $30 a share Celadon was reaching just three years ago.
“The company is doing everything possible to cooperate with the Securities and Exchange Commission,” said Chief Executive of Celadon Paul Svindland.
“I am disappointed that the accounting problems extend back further than previously thought,” he continued.
The root of the accounting errors have been traced back to Celadon’s leasing division, forcing the company to back out of the joint venture. Celadon has since left the leasing sector and plans to focus on what it does best, hauling goods with big rigs.
“The business that created the problems, we are now out of,” added Svindland.
The reevaluation of Celadon’s finances is expected to yield millions of dollars worth of adjustments for the balance sheets reported over the last three and a half years, which could greatly affect the value of the company.
“The cumulative effect of the adjustments, along with operating losses and other expenses since the Company’s last filed financial reports, are expected to reduce its reported stockholders’ equity materially,” Celadon wrote in a public statement following the market close on Monday.
Celadon has not reported its earnings publicly since 2017, around the time the accounting discrepancies were discovered but at the last report the company had $380.5 million in total debt and only $136.7 in cash assets. Celadon has refused to shed light on their current financial status, but Svindland says that the company is “comfortable with our liquidity,” and that bankruptcy is “not an option.”
Celadon is working with advisers as is negotiates with banks and works to comply with the required weekly business updates, as well as identify potential outside lenders, as it works to find a refinancing plan that would boost its cash value.
Celadon says that it is “committed to accurate and transparent financial reporting,” for the foreseeable future.