Horrific price losses
Wirecard shareholder wants compensation – test trial begins
The Wirecard bankruptcy turned the shares of the DAX group into worthless securities and tens of thousands of investors lost money. A model process is intended to speed up the processing of claims for damages.
Four and a half years after the Wirecard bankruptcy, the Bavarian Supreme Court is hearing a model lawsuit from a Hessian shareholder this Friday, representing an avalanche of claims for damages. The model case is essentially representative of a total of 8,500 lawsuits filed by investors in the financial service provider. Together they are demanding 750 million euros in compensation for their share price losses. Because of the expected large crowds, the 1st Civil Senate of the highest Bavarian court has moved the hearing to the coat of arms hall of the former Munich-Riem airport, which actually serves as a venue for conferences or parties.
Former CEO Braun impoverished – target of auditors
At the top of a list of eleven defendants is former Wirecard CEO Markus Braun, with the auditing firm EY in second place. The latter is the actual target of the claims for damages. The former billionaire Braun had invested most of his assets in Wirecard shares. Accordingly, Braun suffered horrendous losses as a result of the Wirecard bankruptcy. Braun has denied all allegations from the start, and EY rejects the claims for damages as unfounded.
Investors are misled into buying stocks by false information
Damaged investors can then hope for compensation if they bought the respective shares because of intentionally false information. In the Wirecard case, it was the presumably fictitious profits in the group’s balance sheets – confirmed several times by the EY auditors. It was only in 2020 that the auditors refused to certify Wirecard’s balance sheet for the previous year.
Munich civil courts are struggling with the Wirecard avalanche
The civil law model case is running parallel, but separate, from the Wirecard criminal case, in which Braun has been on trial as the main defendant on suspicion of fraud for almost two years. The model procedure is intended to simplify and accelerate the legal processing of claims for damages. Because as long as the test case continues, the other lawsuits are suspended. Otherwise, all 8,500 lawsuits would have to be heard and decided separately by the Munich I Regional Court.
However, the judgment in the test case will not automatically mean a decision on all 8,500 lawsuits, but will serve as a kind of blueprint for the remaining proceedings. Aside from the 8,500 plaintiffs, 19,000 other Wirecard investors have filed claims with the court.
Judgment in a few years at the earliest
However, that does not mean that the test case will be a short affair. The Supreme Regional Court assumes that due to the complexity of the process, it will take several years to complete, a spokesman said. Model plaintiff lawyer Peter Mattil is comparatively optimistic and estimates that a judgment in the first instance could be handed down in as little as three years.
dpa
Source: Stern
