Shareholder, employee and consumer representative Schubert Jonckheer & Kolbe said today (September 13) that Plug Power and its CEO Andrew Marsh, as well as Chief Financial Officer Paul Middleton are subject to a consolidated class action securities lawsuit in the US District Court of the Southern district of New York.

Plug Power CEO, Andrew Marsh – © Plug Power

H2 View understands the lawsuit alleges that Plug Power, Marsh and Middleton made false and misleading statement to investors concerning the profitability of the company’s hydrogen fuel cell business.

In a statement, Schubert Konckheer & Kolbe said specifically, among other things, the company and its officers are alleged to have carried out a long-running scheme to misclassify the cost of liquid hydrogen delivered to its customers, therefore inflating the perceived profitability of Plug Power’s core business.

Additionally, the statement says, “On May 14, 2021, the company restated several prior-period financial statements from 2018 through the third quarter of 2020 to address the misclassification. At the same time, Plug Power also disclosed a material weakness in internal controls and announced that the company’s improper accounting practices, allegedly uncovered by a new auditor, dated back to 2016.”

Furthermore, Schubert Konckheer & Kolbe claim shortly before the restatements, Marsh and Middleton sold approximately $45m of their personal holdings of Plug Power stock alongside several other high-level insiders – including at least six directors and the company’s General Counsel and Chief Operating Officer.

Following the allegedly false and misleading statement, Plug Power conducted two lucrative secondary offerings in November 2020 and February 2021, netting together around $3bn of additional capital.

H2 View has not been able to confirm this, however has reached out to Plug Power and Schubert Knockheer & Kolbe for comment on the story, and will bring any and all updates.