SEC investigates Volkswagen for its rebranding gimmick
Volkswagen is being investigated by the United States Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) to see how the automaker’s stock price was affected due to its ‘Voltswagen’ debacle, and whether it broke any securities law, according to Der Spiegel.
The faux rebranding took place on March 29th, when Volkswagen’s American subsidy accidentally published a draft press release about changing its name to Voltswagen. It was followed by an official press release, the very next day which included a statement from Volkswagen America’s CEO who claimed that change was really happening. The change was to be a response to push the company into electric vehicles.
Ultimately, the stunt turned out to be a poorly handled April Fools’ joke (early one), which led to multiple news outlets reporting that the company lied.
At one point, Volkswagen’s stock price increased by 12.5%, which accounted for billions of dollars of market value. it is unclear as to what the SEC is specifically interested in learning about, as the company is not the first one to do so, it comes after Tesla CEO Elon Musk tweeted things that turned out to be untrue for his company.
