Williams Cos. stock off on report of probe

TULSA, Okla. (AP) _ Shares of Williams Cos. fell 4.5 percent Wednesday after a published report said the Securities and Exchange Commission was investigating the energy company's financial reporting

Thursday, April 4th 2002, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

TULSA, Okla. (AP) _ Shares of Williams Cos. fell 4.5 percent Wednesday after a published report said the Securities and Exchange Commission was investigating the energy company's financial reporting practices.

SEC spokeswoman Carol Patterson said she could neither confirm nor deny an investigation, which was first reported Wednesday by The Wall Street Journal.

Jim Gipson, a spokesman for the Tulsa-based oil and gas producer and trader, said the SEC sent the company a letter in February asking ``a couple of routine questions about financial statements filed with the SEC.

``A week later we heard verbally that there were no further questions and we weren't required to change anything. As far as we are concerned, it's a closed matter, and we're not aware of any open issue.''

He said he could not elaborate on the SEC questions.

Williams Cos. closed Wednesday on the New York Stock Exchange at $23.08, down $1.09.

The collapse of energy trader Enron Corp. has heightened investor and regulator scrutiny of corporate accounting. The Wall Street Journal reported that the SEC has doubled the number of inquiries for accounting abuses it opened in the first two months of 2002, compared with the same period in 2001, and that many of the companies targeted have among the nation's largest, including Williams Cos. and Pennsylvania-based cable television provider Adelphia Communications Inc.

Williams Cos., which has about 12,400 employees and reported 2001 revenue of $11 billion, profits from energy trading that can by tricky to value. The company had to delay filing its year-end financial results until it determined how to handle liabilities it had guaranteed from its former unit, Williams Communications Group Inc., an ailing telecommunications concern.

Williams had indirectly backed $1.4 billion in Williams Communications notes and a $750 million lease of a telecom network, among other things, for the former subsidiary, which has run into financial trouble amid a glut in fiber capacity.