Testimony: "The act of combusting money at Wirecard was significant."
In the Wirecard accounting scandal, a consulting firm named FTI Andersch was hired during the summer of 2020 to aid the financial services company in crisis management. However, as stated in court proceedings, they discovered a vast fraudulent system in place. Traces of the nearly two billion euros from the Asia business allegedly remained elusive.
During the Munich Wirecard trial, a key witness from FTI Andersch shed light on suspicions of billions in false transactions at the former DAX company. Before and after the company's collapse in June 2020, the crisis management consulting firm found no proof of the 1.9 billion euros that were supposedly deposited on trust accounts in Southeast Asia. The witness, in a leading role at FTI Andersch, expressed shock at the scale of Wirecard's money burning, estimating a weekly capital decline of approximately 10 million euros.
The witness detailed how FTI Andersch thoroughly examined Wirecard's finances at the request of the company's creditor banks. The investigation uncovered that around 500 million euros had been withdrawn from the company between 2015 and 2020. Most of the reported profits came from "third-party acquirers" (TPAs) in the Middle East and Southeast Asia, who Wirecard claimed were handling credit card payments on behalf of the company. "We looked everywhere," the witness stated. Other Wirecard subsidiaries, however, "produced almost no results." Without the TPA business, the company would have reported losses, the judge inquired. "Yes, that's correct," the witness affirmed.
The - supposedly phony - TPA profits were also credited to the Southeast Asian trust accounts. The witness found it unusual that there were no responses from these business partners or traders after Wirecard's insolvency: "No one from the TPA partners or the traders contacted us."
Later, former Wirecard CEO Markus Braun, who now faces charges, contradicted the claim that Wirecard would have been in the red without third-party partners. Braun contends that between 2014 and 2018, around 1.4 billion euros in gross profit was generated from non-TPA business. Braun maintains his innocence, accusing a group surrounding fugitive sales director Jan Marsalek and co-defendant Oliver Bellenhaus, who is acting as a key witness, of embezzling billions from legitimate businesses.
The witness testified that Braun's assertion of profit generation from non-TPA business was refuted by their investigation, as the supposed profits were also credited to the elusive Southeast Asian trust accounts. In the midst of the Wirecard crisis, FTI Andersch was still unable to locate any traces of the 1.4 billion euros claimed by Braun from non-TPA businesses.
