Corruption

PwC faces 3 major trials that threaten its business

The Big Four global audit firms go to court all the time but are rarely put on trial.

PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, the U.S. member of the global professional-services giant, is currently facing not one, not two, but three significant trials for allegedly negligent audits. An unfavorable verdict in the trial currently playing out in a Florida state court could inflict a significant monetary wound. That, combined with a possible unfavorable judgment in another trial scheduled for federal court in Alabama in February of 2017, and a third in a Manhattan federal court within the next year, may be fatal.

The case against PwC brought by the Taylor Bean and Whitaker bankruptcy trustee is quite unusual, said Tom Rohback, an attorney with Axinn Veltrop & Harkrider. That’s because it is one of the few cases from the credit crisis seeking to hold auditors responsible for crisis-era losses to actually go to trial.