Analysts fear for the future of the Japanese camera manufacturer Olympus. The listed company has Tuesday admitted that the since the nineties, major losses due to failed investments has stashed away in the accounts.
Shuichi Takayama, ceo at Olympus, has conceded that the company since the nineties through the overfactureren of acquisitions of heavy losses, the administration has taken. There would be almost a billion euros have been cheated, so has an independent commission determined that the books could understand. Last month suggested the FBI is already an investigation into the takeover of the company Gyrus Group and Olympus; there would for 687 million dollars in consultants fees are paid, one third of the value of the company.
Takayama argues that the three top people at Olympus for fraud are responsible. One of them, vice-president Hisashi Mori, has now moved on, while former chairman Tsuyoshi Kikukawa a month ago left.
The fraud cases came a few weeks ago to light when the British ceo Michael Woodford was appointed. Woodford, the first non-Japanese ceo of Olympus, was, however, shortly after his appointment in October already dismissed. The Brit argued that his intention to open an investigation into suspicious financial transactions was the impetus for his resignation.
Compared to Reuters suggest analysts to fear for the future of Olympus. So runs the business risk that the by the extensive fraud, one of the largest accounting scandals of the post-war history of Japan, from the fair is met. The share lost by Tuesday nearly one third of its value, while Olympus already more than 70 percent of its market capitalization, had to return since the dismissal of Woodford.
It is unclear how real the chance is that Olympus is going to fall by the vicissitudes. In addition to the senior executives and the auditors that the accounts have been approved, the company is the risk that, in the united states and Japan continued due to beursfraude and with enormous claims to make. If this is the case, then there may be an end to a company that has existed since 1919, is active. Olympus initially started as a manufacturer of microscopes, but in the thirties the company started cameras build. The Japanese company founded, and later also on optical equipment in the medical world can be used, such as gastrocamera and endoscopes.