Reza Saleh, an employee of H. Ross Perot's investment firm who was charged with insider trading, agreed to forfeit $8.6 million in profits to settle with securities regulators.

The European Union ombudsman on Wednesday criticized the antitrust inquiry that led to a €1.06 billion fine against Intel, saying investigators failed to note statements that might have been relevant to the U.S. chip maker’s case.

The ombudsman, P. Nikiforos Diamandouros, said investigators for the European Commission failed to record in their official minutes a meeting they held in August 2006 with a senior executive for Dell, the computer maker, even though the meeting focused on the central allegations in the case.

“This constituted maladministration,” he said.

Following the lead of foreign regulators, New York’s attorney general, Andrew M. Cuomo, filed a federal antitrust lawsuit Wednesday against Intel, the world’s largest chip maker.

Dell Inc. has said in writing that it will pay back $26.5 million in local incentives by mid-February.

Allen Joines, the mayor of Winston-Salem, said yesterday that Dell reconfirmed a pledge that it made Oct. 7 -- shortly after announcing it was closing its desktop-assembly plant in Forsyth County in January and eliminating 905 jobs.