2017-12-16reuters.com

South African tycoon Christo Wiese on Friday called off plans to sell his stake in grocer Shoprite (SHPJ.J) to Steinhoff's African arm (SRRJ.J), a day after he resigned from Steinhoff's board in the midst of an accounting scandal.

...

Banks have sold 98.4 million of the shares they used as security to lend Wiese 1.6 billion euros ($1.89 billion) to fund the purchase of additional shares in Steinhoff in September 2016.

Steinhoff did not name the bank or banks that have exercised their security rights over the stock. Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, HSBC and Nomura provided financing, which was backed by 628 million shares, or 15 percent of the company.

Steinhoff, which moved its primary share listing from Johannesburg to Frankfurt two years ago, has been under investigation for suspected accounting fraud in Germany since 2015. Four current and former managers are under suspicion of having overstated revenues at subsidiaries, prosecutors said.

Here's an FT article on the impact on Wall St. banks (paywall); and another on SA auditors body to probe Deloitte's contribution to Steinhoff scandal as this scandal unfolds.



Comments: Be the first to add a comment

add a comment | go to forum thread