Government regulators announced Friday that video game maker Activision Blizzard has agreed to pay $35 million to settle fees it failed to maintain controls to collect and evaluate workplace complaints regarding disclosure requirements and violations of federal whistleblower protection rules.
The lack of necessary controls, said Jason Burt, director of the SEC’s Denver office, leaves Activision “without the means to determine whether larger issues exist that need to be disclosed to investors. or not.” Commission staff on the possibility that violations of securities laws are not only bad corporate governance, but also illegal.”
In paying the settlement, Activision neither acknowledged nor denied the SEC’s findings and agreed to the cease-and-desist order, the agency said.
Friday’s settlement comes after the Santa Monica, California-based game company ran into difficulties stable with the US workplace regulator in 2021 on employee complaints of sexual harassment. The workers also later accused the company of discriminating against pregnant employees and retaliated against employees who spoke out, including firing them.
In that deal, the makers of Candy Crush, Call of Duty, Overwatch and World of Warcraft agreed to create an $18 million fund to compensate those who experienced harassment or discrimination. The rest of the money will go to charities for women in the video game industry or other gender equality measures. Activision also agreed to strengthen policies and training on harassment and discrimination, and to hire an independent consultant to monitor compliance with US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission requirements. .
A month earlier, in August 2021, the company announced that its president, J. Allen Brack, stepped down after the company was caught up in a discrimination and sexual harassment lawsuit in California. California’s civil rights agency sued the Santa Monica-based company in July 2021, saying its “bad boy” culture has become “a breeding ground for harassment and discrimination against women”.
Shares of Activision fell nearly 2% to $75.60 in afternoon trading Friday. Stocks hovered near $100 in the weeks leading up to a spate of allegations of workplace misconduct in the summer of 2021.
Just over a year ago, Microsoft said paid a whopping 68.7 billion dollars for Activisionbut the deal is in progress held by regulatory bodies in the United States and Europe about anticompetitive concerns.
