In the Complaint, the SEC stated that: "In this case, the Commission alleges that from at least 2000 until 2005, AIG materially falsified its financial statements through a variety of sham transactions and entities who purpose was to paint a falsely rosy picture of AIG's financial results to analysts and investors. Among other things, AIG structured two sham reinsurance transactions with General Re Corporation ('Gen Re'). The purpose of the transactions was to add a total of $500 million in phony loss reserves to AIG's balance sheet in the fourth quarter of 2000 and the first quarter of 2001. The transactions were initiated by AIG to quell criticism by analysts concerning a reduction in AIG's loss reserves in the third quarter of 2000. The transactions had no economic substance, amounting to a round trip of cash, but they were designed to, and did, have a specific and false accounting effect."

The SEC "announced that a federal court has approved the distribution of more than $843 million to harmed investors in the American International Group, Inc. from a Fair Fund that the SEC established after the company’s settlement of an SEC enforcement action for accounting fraud."