An unofficial panel of experts cleared global accounting groups KPMG and Ernst & Young of any responsibility for a $1.7 billion accounting fraud at Japan's Olympus Corp.
The scandal, one of corporate Japan's worst, had raised questions over the role of the two audit firms, which signed off on the accounts of the maker of medical equipment and cameras before the 13-year fraud finally surfaced in October.
The panel effectively found the fraud, identified by a separate investigation as having being hatched by two former top executives in the 1990s to conceal losses, had been too well covered up for the external audit firms to have unraveled it.
"The masterminds of this case were hiding the illegal acts by artfully manipulating experts' opinions," the report said
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