Certification of Financial Statements

In response to a number of financial scandals (including Enron and WorldCom) involving a lapse of internal financial controls, the American Competitiveness and Corporate Accountability (or Sarbanes-Oxley) Act was established in 2002 and introduced new standards for financial audits and internal controls.

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) established detailed procedures that U.S. companies, along with foreign firms listed on the U.S. stock exchange, as well as their auditors must follow in order to document, assess, and improve their internal controls relating to financial reporting.

Pursuant to the Act, CEOs and CFOs of U.S. public companies must certify that:

  • They have reviewed the companies’ financial reports.

  • These reports do not exclude any significant information.

  • Information presented in financial reports is accurate and fairly represents the companies’ operational and financial condition.

  • Each of the certifying officers is responsible for the company’s internal controls, has evaluated them over the course of the period (quarterly or annual) for which the financial reports have been prepared, and has reported any deficiencies in or changes to the existing internal controls.

By signing off on these reports (Exhibit 4.9), the company officers can be held personally and criminally responsible if financial information in the company’s reports is later shown to have been false and misleading.

Exhibit 4.9. Pursuant to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, Ceos and Cfos Must Now Sign off on Their Companies’ Financial Reports Condition
CERTIFICATION PURSUANT TO RULES 13a-14(a) AND 15d-14(a) UNDER THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934, AS AMENDED
I, Jeffrey R. Immelt, certify that:

  1. I have reviewed this annual report on Form 10-K of General Electric Company;

  2. Based on my knowledge, this report does not contain any untrue statement of a material fact or omit to state a material fact necessary to make the statements made, in light of the circumstances under which such statements were made, not misleading with respect to the period covered by this report;

  3. Based on my knowledge, the financial statements, and other financial information included in this report, fairly present in all material respects the financial condition, results of operations and cash flows of the registrant as of, and for, the periods presented in this report;

  4. The registrant’s other certifying officer and I are responsible for establishing and maintaining disclosure controls and procedures (as defined in Exchange Act Rules 13a-15(e) and 15d-15(e)) and internal control over financial reporting (as defined in Exchange Act Rules 13a-15(f) and 15d-15(f)) for the registrant and have:

    1. Designed such disclosure controls and procedures, or caused such disclosure controls and procedures to be designed under our supervision, to ensure that material information relating to the registrant, including its consolidated subsidiaries, is made known to us by others within those entities, particularly during the period in which this report is being prepared;

    2. Designed such internal control over financial reporting, or caused such internal control over financial reporting to be designed under our supervision, to provide reasonable assurance regarding the reliability of financial reporting and the preparation of financial statements for external purposes in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles;

    3. Evaluated the effectiveness of the registrant’s disclosure controls and procedures and presented in this report our conclusions about the effectiveness of the disclosure controls and procedures, as of the end of the period covered by this report based on such evaluation; and

    4. Disclosed in this report any change in the registrant’s internal control over financial reporting that occurred during the registrant’s most recent fiscal quarter that has materially affected, or is reasonably likely to materially affect, the registrant’s internal control over financial reporting; and

  5. The registrant’s other certifying officer and I have disclosed, based on our most recent evaluation of internal control over financial reporting, to the registrant’s auditors and the audit committee of registrant’s board of directors:

    1. All significant deficiencies and material weaknesses in the design or operation of internal control over financial reporting which are reasonably likely to adversely affect the registrant’s ability to record, process, summarize and report financial information; and

    2. Any fraud, whether or not material, that involves management or other employees who have a significant role in the registrant’s internal control over financial reporting.

Date: March 3,2006
/s/ Jeffrey R. Immelt
Jeffrey R. Immelt
Chief Executive Officer

Source: Reprinted with permission from GE.


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