The Indian affiliate of PricewaterhouseCoopers routinely failed to follow the most basic audit procedures, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission said Tuesday as it penalized the firm for its failed audits of Satyam Computer Services, the Indian company that falsely reported more than $1 billion in profits.

The S.E.C. and the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board fined the affiliate, PW India, $7.5 million in what was described as the largest American penalty ever against a foreign accounting firm.

The Satyam fraud, which was exposed in early 2009 when the company’s chairman admitted it, stunned India and American investors who had relied upon the company’s statements. The company’s securities traded on the New York Stock Exchange, as well as in Indian markets. Former Satyam officials, as well as two partners in PW India, face criminal charges in a trial under way in India.

The S.E.C. said the auditors had failed to independently confirm cash balances in bank accounts that supposedly rose to over $1 billion by the time the fraud ended. Had the balances been real, they would have accounted for more than half the company’s assets. The company later said that its actual cash balances at the end of September 2008 were $66 million, not the more than $1 billion it claimed.