An unusual investment in stricken German digital payments firm Wirecard that was structured last year by executives at SoftBank’s Vision Fund helped the company to fend off doubts about its viability for over 12 months, until an apparent €1.9 billion accounting fraud emerged in June.
Wirecard has since lost most of a listed stock value that was once over €20 billion – a failure that was described by Felix Hufeld, head of German financial regulator BaFin, as “a complete disaster”.
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