JACKSONVILLE, Florida (From the Florida Times-Union) -- A handful of shareholders of Rayonier Inc. have filed class action lawsuits against the company, saying they bought its stock at inflated prices after it gave incorrect information about its timber inventory.

Rayonier, a Jacksonville-based company that owns 2.6 million acres of timber forest in the United States and New Zealand, said in a Nov. 10 SEC filing that it overstated its income by about $1.9 million in its first quarter earnings report and by about $2 million in the second quarter.

In those reports, the company listed timber inventory that it later concluded wasn't saleable because it is in "restricted, environmentally sensitive or economically inaccessible areas," according to SEC filings. In amended filings, the company reduced its timber inventory by about 10 percent, from 88.5 million tons to 80.1 million tons.

The company didn't respond to a request for comment Monday afternoon.

Four separate lawsuits claim that Rayonier, by misreporting its timber inventory, caused some shareholders to buy stock at artificially high prices. The suits also claim that shareholders lost money when Rayonier's stock fell after the company corrected its inventory numbers.

The cases will probably be joined in January, said Phillip Kim, an attorney at New York-based Rosen Law Firm, which represents one of the shareholders.

To read the entire story, click here.