Tesco‘s accounting scandal has once again come back to haunt it as lawyers push investors to back fresh legal action.
Rosenblatt Solicitors have stated that the shareholders‘ current payouts do “not extend far enough” and has called on investors to back legal proceedings.
It has accused the UK‘s largest supermarket of submitting innacurate financial figures “for much longer” than the period investigated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).
The investigation led to the Serious Fraud Office handing Tesco a landmark £129 million fine which it has only just begun to fully recover from.
READ MORE: Tesco could be fined “well in excess” of £100m over accounting scandal
“We believe the FCA compensation scheme does not extend far enough,” Rosenblatt‘s managing partner Tania MacLeod said.
“What is beyond doubt is that, even on the findings of Tesco’s own investigation, the reporting of its financial information was overstated long before August 29 2014 and thus there is a likelihood that investors bought stock at inflated prices going back to at least 2013.”
In March the FCA stated that investors had paid a higher price than they should have for shares in 2014, after the grocer inflated its profit statements.
They were therefore entitled to compensation of 24.5p per share purchased, as well as interest of 1.25 per cent per year for institutional investors and four per cent interest if they are retail investors.
The law firm states that it has not been determined whether this rate was “fair and reasonable” to investors.
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