Transcon to restate financials after finding $20 million in errors

Printer and media company Transcontinental Inc. is restating its financial statements for prior years to correct $20 million in accounting errors. The Canadian Press reported that the errors involved $10 million in accounting provisions for income tax liabilities in fiscal 2006 and $10 million in overstatement of the value of assets in the far-flung company's Mexican properties in several prior years.

"The restatement will not impact Transcontinental's business, its current earnings or its ability to generate cash flow," said Benoit Huard, chief financial officer. (Before the restatements, the company had said it earned $137.9 million in 2006 and total property, plant and equipment was $713.6 million.) The company said it did not expect the restatement to affect its reporting of 2007 results later this month.

In addition to being the largest consumer magazine publisher in Canada and its second-largest community newspaper publisher, Transcontinental is Canada's largest printer and the sixth-largest in North America.