3M Tried to Hide Payments for China Officials’ Travel: SEC (1)

3M Co. will pay more than $6.5 million to settle Securities and Exchange Commission allegations that it tried to hide payments to send Chinese government officials on overseas vacations and shopping sprees.

The SEC claimed that 3M’s China subsidiary spent $1 million to send officials from state-owned health-care facilities and their spouses to US and Australian cities. The company paid for about 24 trips — which were ostensibly to attend educational events — between 2014 and 2017, according to the order.

Employees of the Chinese unit sent “alternate itineraries” using private WeChat accounts or hand-delivered them to the officials, the ...