Vince McMahon simply reached a take care of the feds in his hush cash case … with the previous WWE honcho agreeing to fork over $1.7 million to place the matter in his rearview mirror.
The Securities and Exchange Commission mentioned Friday it discovered McMahon paid a former worker $3 million in 2019 and an ex-independent contractor $7.5 million in 2022 to purchase their silence when it got here to allegations in opposition to him and his firm, the WWE.
The SEC, although, says McMahon by no means correctly disclosed the agreements to the WWE’s Board of Directors and different officers on the wrestling org. — a giant no-no that resulted in violations.
“Company executives can not enter into materials agreements on behalf of the corporate they serve and withhold that data from the corporate’s management capabilities and auditor,” New York Regional Office exec Thomas P. Smith Jr. mentioned.
In order to make issues proper, the SEC says McMahon agreed to pay a $400,000 high quality … in addition to reimburse the WWE $1,330,915.90.
It must be famous the feds mentioned McMahon didn’t admit or deny their findings.
McMahon mentioned in an announcement on X on Friday morning he was “thrilled” with the decision.
“The case is closed,” he wrote. “Today ends almost three years of investigation by completely different governmental companies. There has been an excessive amount of hypothesis about what precisely the federal government was investigating and what the result could be.”
“As in the present day’s decision exhibits, a lot of that hypothesis was misguided and deceptive. In the tip, there was by no means something extra to this than minor accounting errors with regard to some private funds that I made a number of years in the past whereas I used to be CEO of WWE. I’m thrilled that I can now put all this behind me.”
The Wall Street Journal first reported McMahon was underneath investigation over alleged hush cash funds again in 2022 … and the fallout from all of it resulted within the 79-year-old stepping down from his position within the WWE.
He later returned … however following an explosive sexual assault lawsuit that was filed by a former WWE staffer, he resigned because the Executive Chairman of TKO, the corporate that owns WWE.