Vivendi faces fresh investigations

The company said that the US Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York had opened a preliminary criminal investigation into the business and that the Securities and Exchange Commission's Florida office, which is conducting its own informal inquiry, would co-ordinate its activities with the new inquiry.

The company did not disclose what the investigations were centred around but seem likely to follow a similar line to French investigations, which are examining whether the firm published false accounts in 2000 and 2001 in order to hide the true nature of its financial situation.