Macquarie acknowledges 60 short-selling ‘suspects’
Around 60 current and former Macquarie Group staff including the company’s chief executive have been acknowledged as having been designated as suspects in a German investigation into short-selling activities almost a decade ago.
Macquarie Group Limited (MGL) has issued a formal assurance that it has appropriately provisioned for continuing action by German authorities relating to what it describes as an “historical German lending transaction”.
The big financial services group said the provisioning related to the transaction in 2011 and involved an industry-wide investigation relating to dividend trading.
“As part of their industry-wide investigation, the authorities have recently designated as suspects approximately 60 current and former Macquarie staff in relation to historical short selling-related activities, most of whom are no longer at Macquarie and some of whom are already named in relation to the 2011 lending matter, including the MGL CEO,” the company told the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX).
“No information of detail or particularity has been provided regarding the naming of these people other than that it relates to short-selling related activities.”
“The total amount at issue is not considered to be material and MGL has provided for the matter. We note that no current staff members have been interviewed to date,” the ASX statement said.
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