Marvell fingered over stock grants

MARVELL, the company that recently agreed to acquire Intel's comms chip business, is the latest firm to be fingered by the SEC on - all together now - stock option grants.

My colleague Cher Price recently reported that Marvell shares took a knock in the aftermath of the Intel deal. They have taken another in the last couple of days after the firm revealed that the SEC and US grand jury had requested documents to how and when the company had granted options.

Marvell joins a long list of the great and - until proven otherwise - good to attract the attention of the powers that be on stock awards, big business's manna beyond salary.

Shares of Opsware and Quest Software also fell on similar disclosures while CA and Apple continue to help with investigations. µ