Cendant Reports Restated Earnings

Cendant Corp., the troubled franchising and marketing company behind brands such as Avis, filed its long-awaited restatement of past results with the Securities and Exchange Commission, clearing the way for regulatory review of the company’s proposed $3.1-billion purchase of American Bankers Insurance Group Inc. Cendant’s results for 1995 through last year were recalculated to exclude $700 million in accounting fraud and errors at CUC International, which merged with HFS Inc. in December to create Cendant, based in Parsippany, N.J. Since the accounting debacle was disclosed in April, Cendant has become the subject of numerous shareholder lawsuits. A summer boardroom purge claimed former CUC Chairman Walter Forbes, who was replaced as Cendant chairman by Henry Silverman, former chairman of HFS. Separately, Cendant said in its filing that Forbes made nearly $10 million in 1997. Forbes received $8.3 million in compensation in addition to his salary and bonus that dwarfed the $268,513 extra pay he received in 1996, the SEC filing said. He received a $35-million severance package when he left Cendant. Cendant shares fell 69 cents to close at $12.63; American Bankers rose $1.25 to $43. Both trade on the NYSE.