The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC from the Securities and Exchange Commission) investigates the name “Volt car” of Volkswagen to find out if the stunt affected the automaker's stock price and if any laws were broken, according with Der Spiegel.
The new name was announced on March 29, when the US subsidiary Volkswagen "accidentally" published a draft press release for change of the name of the local company in Voltswagen for its promotion in electric vehicles.
Some news agencies published the news and the company released an official press release on March 30, which included excerpts from Volkswagen CEO Scott Keogh who claimed the change would actually happen.
Eventually, as it turned out, it was an April Fool's joke and many news agencies - including the Associated Press - reproduced the news.
Volkswagen stock price rose as much as 12,5 percent at this stage, equivalent to billions of dollars in market value.
So the SEC wants to know what really happened, or what laws could have been violated by VW.
