Aloha Petroleum, Ltd. is a company that owns numerous convenience store

Convenience store

A convenience store, corner store, corner shop, commonly called a bodega in Spanish-speaking areas of the United States, is a small store or shop in a built up area that stocks a range of everyday items such as groceries, toiletries, alcoholic and soft drinks, and may also offer money order and...

s (Island Mini Mart) and gas stations (Aloha Quality Gas) in Hawaii

Hawaii

Hawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of...

, many of which are operated by independent convenience store owners such as 7-Eleven

7-Eleven

7-Eleven is part of an international chain of convenience stores, operating under Seven-Eleven Japan Co. Ltd, which in turn is owned by Seven & I Holdings Co...

.

The company also has federal

Federal government of the United States

The federal government of the United States is the national government of the constitutional republic of fifty states that is the United States of America. The federal government comprises three distinct branches of government: a legislative, an executive and a judiciary. These branches and...

, state, city and county contracts and supplies gasoline to other convenience stores and gas stations not branded as Aloha Gas or Island Mini Mart, including Costco

Costco

Costco Wholesale Corporation is the largest membership warehouse club chain in the United States. it is the third largest retailer in the United States, where it originated, and the ninth largest in the world...

, Freedom, NEX and AAFES. Aloha Petroleum Ltd. also owns the Mahalo branded gas stations.

Aloha was part of a controversial deal in which Harken Energy

Harken Energy

HKN, Inc., formerly known as Harken Energy Corporation, is a small American oil and gas production company, with ownership interests in other production companies. The company is headquartered in Southlake, Texas, near Fort Worth. There is a second office near Dallas, in the town of Paris. The...

 sold the company to a group of investors that included two of Harken's own board members, turning Harken's equity

Ownership equity

In accounting and finance, equity is the residual claim or interest of the most junior class of investors in assets, after all liabilities are paid. If liability exceeds assets, negative equity exists...

 stake in Aloha into a loan, and thereby disguising most of their 1989 losses. This technique of inflating profits was used more famously by Enron

Enron

Enron Corporation was an American energy, commodities, and services company based in Houston, Texas. Before its bankruptcy on December 2, 2001, Enron employed approximately 22,000 staff and was one of the world's leading electricity, natural gas, communications, and pulp and paper companies, with...

. The same accounting firm, Arthur Andersen

Arthur Andersen

Arthur Andersen LLP, based in Chicago, was once one of the "Big Five" accounting firms among PricewaterhouseCoopers, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, Ernst & Young and KPMG, providing auditing, tax, and consulting services to large corporations...

, was responsible for the Aloha Petroleum deal.