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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- SkyWest Inc. has notified shareholders and the Securities and Exchange Commission that documents disclosing stock transactions by company officials and directors going as far back as 1996 were misplaced or never given to federal regulators.
The St. George-based regional airline said that during a review of its records for 2005, it discovered dozens of required disclosure reports were not in the SEC's electronic database.
In some cases, SkyWest received copies of disclosure documents and believed they were filed on time, but no record exists at the SEC. In other cases, grants of options were never reported.
The mistakes were reported to investors in the company's annual proxy statement sent in March to shareholders in advance of SkyWest's annual meeting earlier this month. The executives and directors also submitted dozens of disclosure documents to the SEC before the meeting to correct the oversights and discrepancies.
The proxy shows 10 current officers and directors, as well as one former director, have submitted 43 disclosure reports covering 172 transactions representing thousands of shares that were not filed in a timely fashion.
Among officers involved were Chief Executive Jerry Atkin, Chief Financial Officer Bradford Rich and Ron Reber, president of SkyWest Airlines, a subsidiary. Other late filers were former and current directors.
SkyWest shares traded from $3.09 to $4.93 in 1996, with stock splits in 1998 and 2000. In 2005, the share price ranged from $16.05 to $32.84.
Michael Kraupp, SkyWest treasurer, declined to comment, saying through an assistant that the proxy contained all the information the company can provide.
Buying or selling of company shares by corporate officers is legal when trades are based on information in the public realm. It is illegal if transactions occur before sensitive information becomes public.
It's possible that many of the documents were lost because the old method of disclosing insider trades was complicated, an expert said.
The Internet-based filing system used now replaced more-cumbersome paper procedures that relied on mail and data entry, opening the possibility of something getting lost, Alan Jagolinzer, an accounting professor at Stanford University's graduate school of business, told The Salt Lake Tribune.
SEC spokesman John Heine would not say whether the agency is conducting an inquiry.
(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
