1
00:00:02,000 --> 00:00:07,000
Downloaded from
YTS.MX
2
00:00:06,000 --> 00:00:06,880
[phone rings]
3
00:00:07,720 --> 00:00:12,640
[man in German] In Autumn 2019,
I got a call from a source.
4
00:00:08,000 --> 00:00:13,000
Official YIFY movies site:
YTS.MX
5
00:00:14,040 --> 00:00:16,960
He asks me,
"Have you ever looked into Wirecard?"
6
00:00:18,840 --> 00:00:20,520
"The payment processor? No."
7
00:00:22,600 --> 00:00:24,440
"It's a very strange company."
8
00:00:24,520 --> 00:00:26,720
"Companies are being set up."
9
00:00:26,800 --> 00:00:29,520
"Money comes in, money goes out."
10
00:00:30,800 --> 00:00:32,640
That is totally spooky.
11
00:00:34,120 --> 00:00:38,440
He'd been called by foreign friends
12
00:00:38,520 --> 00:00:41,920
who used to work in intelligence agencies,
13
00:00:42,000 --> 00:00:43,440
and they warned him,
14
00:00:44,040 --> 00:00:46,080
"Are you interested in Wirecard?"
15
00:00:46,160 --> 00:00:47,720
"Keep your hands off it."
16
00:00:47,800 --> 00:00:49,800
[tense music plays]
17
00:00:54,960 --> 00:00:57,040
[reporter 1 in English]
Scandal involving a German
18
00:00:57,120 --> 00:00:59,160
digital payments company, Wirecard.
19
00:01:00,960 --> 00:01:03,480
[reporter 2 in German]
Mr. Braun, reports about your business
20
00:01:03,560 --> 00:01:06,120
read like a financial thriller.
21
00:01:06,200 --> 00:01:09,360
[reporter 1 in English] How do you
simply miss a couple of billion dollars?
22
00:01:09,440 --> 00:01:11,040
[reporter 2 in German] Bogus sales,
23
00:01:11,120 --> 00:01:12,960
balance sheet manipulations,
many allegations.
24
00:01:13,040 --> 00:01:14,640
How bad is it going to get?
25
00:01:15,680 --> 00:01:18,720
[reporter 3 in English]
Money laundering, gambling, porn,
26
00:01:19,440 --> 00:01:21,320
helping terrorist organizations.
27
00:01:22,360 --> 00:01:24,920
[man 1] It was
the Financial Times versus Wirecard.
28
00:01:25,000 --> 00:01:28,040
-[camera shutter clicks]
-They were trying to find information,
29
00:01:28,120 --> 00:01:30,680
and then Wirecard were trying
to find information back.
30
00:01:31,360 --> 00:01:33,320
[man 2] It was a total deepfake.
31
00:01:33,840 --> 00:01:36,800
It looked like a bank,
but it was actually a robbery.
32
00:01:38,360 --> 00:01:41,840
[reporter 4 in German] The former COO,
Jan Marsalek, is on the run.
33
00:01:42,680 --> 00:01:45,360
[reporter 5] The biggest fraud scandal
in German history.
34
00:01:47,120 --> 00:01:50,320
[reporter 6] There's
an international manhunt for Jan Marsalek.
35
00:01:50,400 --> 00:01:53,120
[tense music continues]
36
00:01:55,360 --> 00:01:58,640
[woman] It's unbelievable how something
like this can survive for so long.
37
00:01:59,640 --> 00:02:02,280
[man 3] It was clear to me
this was going to be a huge story.
38
00:02:06,840 --> 00:02:09,320
[tense music ends]
39
00:02:12,720 --> 00:02:14,720
[ominous music plays]
40
00:02:16,120 --> 00:02:19,040
[man in German] Scammers take advantage
of people's desires.
41
00:02:21,440 --> 00:02:25,440
In Germany, the desire was,
"We want to be at the front of the pack."
42
00:02:27,360 --> 00:02:29,480
Germany's industry is extremely successful
43
00:02:29,560 --> 00:02:31,240
but very old, very traditional.
44
00:02:31,320 --> 00:02:37,000
These famous German brands
like Siemens, Daimler, BMW, Volkswagen,
45
00:02:37,080 --> 00:02:39,640
these are all very old companies.
46
00:02:41,280 --> 00:02:43,120
That's why German politicians
47
00:02:43,200 --> 00:02:45,480
and German business people
are often asked,
48
00:02:45,560 --> 00:02:47,520
"Where are actually your new companies?"
49
00:02:49,720 --> 00:02:54,080
We want a major, global,
digital champion of our own
50
00:02:54,160 --> 00:02:55,640
like in Silicon Valley.
51
00:02:56,720 --> 00:02:59,640
The German Google, the German Facebook.
52
00:03:00,720 --> 00:03:05,200
And Wirecard played
on that desire beautifully.
53
00:03:07,080 --> 00:03:08,760
[man in English] Discover Wirecard.
54
00:03:08,840 --> 00:03:12,920
We develop financial technologies
that make payments mobile, seamless,
55
00:03:13,000 --> 00:03:14,480
and almost invisible.
56
00:03:15,360 --> 00:03:16,720
Partner up with Wirecard,
57
00:03:16,800 --> 00:03:20,880
the world's leading innovation driver
in digital financial technology.
58
00:03:20,960 --> 00:03:22,680
[crowd cheers]
59
00:03:22,760 --> 00:03:24,080
He's a hero, a rock star.
60
00:03:24,160 --> 00:03:28,440
Please give a very warm welcome
to the CEO and CTO of Wirecard,
61
00:03:28,520 --> 00:03:29,720
Dr. Markus Braun.
62
00:03:29,800 --> 00:03:30,880
[crowd applauds]
63
00:03:30,960 --> 00:03:33,120
Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
64
00:03:33,760 --> 00:03:36,000
[in German]
Wirecard was like the German PayPal.
65
00:03:36,080 --> 00:03:39,080
[in English] And in one sentence,
that's our business model.
66
00:03:39,760 --> 00:03:41,560
[woman in German] Wirecard the processor
67
00:03:41,640 --> 00:03:43,640
for online trade, online shops.
68
00:03:44,720 --> 00:03:47,520
They make sure when I buy something,
69
00:03:47,600 --> 00:03:51,720
the money gets from my credit card
to the online retailer.
70
00:03:51,800 --> 00:03:54,040
[in English] It's not about owning data,
71
00:03:54,800 --> 00:03:59,880
but it's about the algorithms
that deliver a value out of data.
72
00:03:59,960 --> 00:04:03,640
[Lena in German]
There's a company founder dressed
73
00:04:03,720 --> 00:04:07,720
in a black turtleneck
with a neat turn of phrase…
74
00:04:07,800 --> 00:04:10,360
[in English]
The business model delivers a value-add,
75
00:04:11,360 --> 00:04:13,280
and where there is a value-add,
76
00:04:13,800 --> 00:04:16,760
you have the money to reinvent.
77
00:04:16,840 --> 00:04:19,440
[Lena in German]
…who presents himself as a visionary.
78
00:04:20,480 --> 00:04:22,440
The "Steve Jobs of the Alps."
79
00:04:37,080 --> 00:04:38,920
[in English] My name is Martin Osterloh.
80
00:04:39,440 --> 00:04:42,280
I worked for Wirecard for 16 years.
81
00:04:43,800 --> 00:04:50,360
When I joined in 2005,
we were about 130, 150 people.
82
00:04:51,200 --> 00:04:56,760
When I left Wirecard,
there were over 6,500 individuals.
83
00:04:58,760 --> 00:05:01,680
[in German] Wirecard is one of
the fastest-growing
84
00:05:01,760 --> 00:05:03,440
financial commerce platforms.
85
00:05:04,200 --> 00:05:05,880
[Martin in English] When at Wirecard,
86
00:05:05,960 --> 00:05:12,920
there was an extremely proud sense
of being a big German technology company.
87
00:05:13,000 --> 00:05:17,080
[reporter in German] Wirecard jumped
on the digital train in the '90s
88
00:05:17,160 --> 00:05:19,040
that continues to pick up speed,
89
00:05:19,120 --> 00:05:23,000
and now Wirecard
has even overtaken Deutsche Bank
90
00:05:23,080 --> 00:05:26,640
with their worth placed
at over €20 billion.
91
00:05:26,720 --> 00:05:30,200
A symbol
for the new era of the finance sector.
92
00:05:31,440 --> 00:05:33,800
[woman] This was a company on the rise.
93
00:05:34,520 --> 00:05:40,200
It grew unlike any other company
we'd seen in Germany.
94
00:05:41,120 --> 00:05:47,280
And that rise, that immense growth,
led many people to believe in it.
95
00:05:49,080 --> 00:05:52,960
[Florian] New, successful,
global, profitable
96
00:05:53,520 --> 00:05:56,960
and German politicians were proud
to be able to say,
97
00:05:57,040 --> 00:05:59,000
"Hey. We have a FinTech company!"
98
00:05:59,840 --> 00:06:02,680
[Lena] When the chancellor went to China,
99
00:06:02,760 --> 00:06:07,400
she actually campaigned
for Wirecard in 2019 with Xi Jinping.
100
00:06:08,760 --> 00:06:12,520
[Cansel] Everyone in Germany
believed in this company.
101
00:06:13,880 --> 00:06:17,000
No one would have believed
that this was the work of gangsters.
102
00:06:18,520 --> 00:06:20,520
[suspenseful music plays]
103
00:06:34,160 --> 00:06:36,680
[in English] Being a journalist,
you get to do all sorts of things
104
00:06:36,760 --> 00:06:38,320
which you're not supposed to.
105
00:06:44,360 --> 00:06:45,800
You're exposing secrets.
106
00:06:52,840 --> 00:06:55,520
The first time
I ever heard the word Wirecard,
107
00:06:55,600 --> 00:06:59,080
I was looking for dodgy companies
to write about.
108
00:06:59,160 --> 00:07:03,680
Corporate frauds, things like that,
because they make great stories.
109
00:07:06,160 --> 00:07:08,920
I was chatting
to this Australian hedge-fund manager.
110
00:07:09,000 --> 00:07:13,360
He's like, "So would you be interested
in some German gangsters?"
111
00:07:14,560 --> 00:07:17,280
I think he looked to the accounts
and thought it was a fraud.
112
00:07:17,360 --> 00:07:18,760
So I made a note,
113
00:07:19,280 --> 00:07:21,560
"Wirecard, something to look into."
114
00:07:21,640 --> 00:07:23,840
[suspenseful music continues]
115
00:07:23,920 --> 00:07:27,360
From the outside,
it looked like a legitimate enterprise.
116
00:07:30,240 --> 00:07:33,280
I mean, it had 6,000 people.
It had offices.
117
00:07:33,360 --> 00:07:34,280
[phone rings]
118
00:07:34,360 --> 00:07:35,440
The profits were great.
119
00:07:35,520 --> 00:07:38,160
And so I think
it just sort of fitted into this,
120
00:07:38,240 --> 00:07:40,720
"Online payments.
That's growing quickly, isn't it?"
121
00:07:44,280 --> 00:07:46,120
But this big pile of documents,
122
00:07:46,200 --> 00:07:49,200
which showed all these deals
Wirecard had done in Asia,
123
00:07:49,280 --> 00:07:52,000
and something about them
just seemed a bit off,
124
00:07:52,520 --> 00:07:54,480
that they didn't quite seem real.
125
00:07:55,480 --> 00:08:00,760
[Markus in German] Outside of Europe,
we see a growth of 25%
126
00:08:00,840 --> 00:08:06,160
strongly driven by new regions,
by developing regions of Asia.
127
00:08:08,280 --> 00:08:11,000
[Dan in English] Wirecard didn't appear
to grow by adding customers,
128
00:08:11,080 --> 00:08:13,640
like Spotify might add subscribers.
129
00:08:13,720 --> 00:08:17,400
It was buying its growth
by buying businesses, mostly in Asia.
130
00:08:17,920 --> 00:08:20,000
But, basically, the numbers don't add up.
131
00:08:21,480 --> 00:08:23,840
-I tried to talk to Wirecard.
-[phone rings]
132
00:08:23,920 --> 00:08:28,080
They were like, "We're very busy dealing
with our results. We can't talk to you."
133
00:08:28,680 --> 00:08:32,680
Normal companies don't do that
when Financial Times knocks on the door.
134
00:08:33,560 --> 00:08:35,040
[phone rings]
135
00:08:35,120 --> 00:08:36,200
So, I persisted.
136
00:08:39,000 --> 00:08:41,520
Eventually, they put Markus Braun
on the phone.
137
00:08:46,200 --> 00:08:47,160
[Dan talks]
138
00:08:47,880 --> 00:08:48,800
[Markus talks]
139
00:08:48,880 --> 00:08:51,560
[Dan talks]
140
00:08:51,640 --> 00:08:54,240
[Markus talks]
141
00:08:54,320 --> 00:08:56,800
[Dan laughs, talks]
142
00:08:56,880 --> 00:09:02,600
[Markus talks]
143
00:09:11,080 --> 00:09:14,080
"We are a software company
which has a bank as a daughter."
144
00:09:15,160 --> 00:09:17,600
There were many weird things
about that conversation.
145
00:09:17,680 --> 00:09:22,480
[Dan talks]
146
00:09:38,560 --> 00:09:42,680
[Markus talks]
147
00:10:00,520 --> 00:10:06,480
Wirecard always had the same playbook
each time it was criticized.
148
00:10:06,560 --> 00:10:11,720
It would say that the critics
were in league with short sellers
149
00:10:11,800 --> 00:10:14,080
seeking to manipulate the share price.
150
00:10:14,160 --> 00:10:16,160
[suspenseful music intensifies]
151
00:10:27,200 --> 00:10:28,800
[in German] My name is Tobias Bosler,
152
00:10:28,880 --> 00:10:32,280
and I have been,
for many years, a short seller.
153
00:10:33,720 --> 00:10:37,720
Most people invest
thinking a share price will rise.
154
00:10:39,000 --> 00:10:45,240
A short seller differs from an investor
by making money when a share price falls
155
00:10:45,920 --> 00:10:48,640
and loses money when it increases.
156
00:10:49,560 --> 00:10:52,040
[man in English] The narrative
that's given around short sellers
157
00:10:52,120 --> 00:10:56,240
is that they're there to just drive
the share prices down on companies
158
00:10:56,320 --> 00:10:57,440
to seek a profit.
159
00:10:58,480 --> 00:11:02,680
Certain areas of the investment community
would probably view short sellers
160
00:11:02,760 --> 00:11:06,440
as loosely affiliated
with some sort of financial terrorist.
161
00:11:06,520 --> 00:11:08,080
Now, the reality of the situation
162
00:11:08,160 --> 00:11:12,120
is that most short sellers
would take a short position
163
00:11:12,200 --> 00:11:15,400
because they think fundamentally
a stock is overvalued.
164
00:11:15,480 --> 00:11:17,480
[sirens wailing]
165
00:11:21,000 --> 00:11:22,600
[Fahmi] We are short sellers.
166
00:11:23,440 --> 00:11:28,400
In fact, we're the only "short only,
woman only" fund out there in the world.
167
00:11:30,120 --> 00:11:33,400
We exclusively make money
by betting against stocks,
168
00:11:33,480 --> 00:11:35,960
betting that the prices
of those stocks will fall.
169
00:11:36,040 --> 00:11:39,240
And we gain our conviction
around these bets
170
00:11:39,320 --> 00:11:43,080
by doing a lot of deep investigative work
to make sure that we're right.
171
00:11:44,520 --> 00:11:47,520
[Matthew] I mean, it's a lot like being
a financial detective.
172
00:11:48,200 --> 00:11:53,160
I mean, what we look at are companies
that we think are generally up to no good.
173
00:11:54,920 --> 00:11:58,000
[Tobias in German]
I investigated Wirecard for two years.
174
00:11:59,400 --> 00:12:02,200
I understood its business model perfectly.
175
00:12:02,960 --> 00:12:08,520
It handled payments for online businesses
in pornography and online gambling,
176
00:12:09,680 --> 00:12:11,080
but it wasn't illegal.
177
00:12:14,720 --> 00:12:17,760
[Martin in English] It was certainly
a big part of what we did,
178
00:12:17,840 --> 00:12:21,680
and it made the company very strong
at the beginning.
179
00:12:22,720 --> 00:12:27,960
Everything from poker companies,
casinos, bingo,
180
00:12:28,480 --> 00:12:30,520
certainly also pornography.
181
00:12:31,560 --> 00:12:33,600
But we didn't call them porn.
182
00:12:33,680 --> 00:12:35,240
[interviewer] What would you call them?
183
00:12:35,320 --> 00:12:37,280
Emotional content.
184
00:12:37,840 --> 00:12:38,880
[laughs]
185
00:12:38,960 --> 00:12:40,960
[interviewer laughs]
186
00:12:43,640 --> 00:12:46,280
-[interviewer] Are you joking?
-I'm not joking.
187
00:12:47,920 --> 00:12:53,480
[in German] The poker market in the US
was 50% of the global poker market.
188
00:12:55,040 --> 00:12:59,000
But that all changed in 2006
189
00:12:59,080 --> 00:13:03,640
when a new law in America made it illegal
190
00:13:03,720 --> 00:13:08,320
to handle payments
for US citizens playing poker.
191
00:13:08,400 --> 00:13:13,400
So Wirecard lost a major source of income.
192
00:13:14,440 --> 00:13:18,800
But, in spite of this law,
the profits of Wirecard kept rising.
193
00:13:21,360 --> 00:13:23,280
What company is able to do that?
194
00:13:24,160 --> 00:13:26,120
This can't be right.
195
00:13:29,040 --> 00:13:32,360
[Dan in English] We're trying to write
the story, but it was complicated.
196
00:13:32,440 --> 00:13:35,880
I'd go backwards and forwards
and basically got nothing.
197
00:13:36,840 --> 00:13:38,120
At that point, I'd given up
198
00:13:38,200 --> 00:13:41,440
because nobody seemed interested
in the Wirecard story.
199
00:13:41,520 --> 00:13:43,320
And then I get this phone call.
200
00:13:43,400 --> 00:13:44,600
[tense music plays]
201
00:13:44,680 --> 00:13:46,920
So I went to meet this guy, Matt Earl.
202
00:13:47,000 --> 00:13:50,680
I think he rang me up and said,
"Hey. Do you wanna go meet for lunch?"
203
00:13:52,280 --> 00:13:53,600
He was a short seller.
204
00:13:54,440 --> 00:13:57,320
And also he wrote blogs about frauds.
205
00:13:57,400 --> 00:13:58,760
This thing called Zatarra.
206
00:14:01,320 --> 00:14:03,520
[Matthew] The first time
I became aware of Wirecard
207
00:14:03,600 --> 00:14:07,720
was when a reader of the blog that I wrote
reached out to me to say,
208
00:14:07,800 --> 00:14:10,640
"Have you looked at this German payments
business, Wirecard?"
209
00:14:12,040 --> 00:14:16,360
There was allegations
that Wirecard had been involved
210
00:14:16,440 --> 00:14:19,360
in a money-laundering operation
in Florida.
211
00:14:20,960 --> 00:14:22,160
There was press reports
212
00:14:22,240 --> 00:14:26,520
that they had been processing
unlawful gambling-related monies
213
00:14:26,600 --> 00:14:28,360
into the United States.
214
00:14:28,440 --> 00:14:29,360
That was illegal.
215
00:14:29,440 --> 00:14:31,280
So I thought, "Let's have a look at this."
216
00:14:33,720 --> 00:14:36,400
[Dan] The meeting was
in a Japanese restaurant in the city.
217
00:14:37,120 --> 00:14:40,400
And so we sort of sit down,
you know, order, and it's like,
218
00:14:40,480 --> 00:14:42,640
"Okay. What's going on?"
219
00:14:43,920 --> 00:14:46,000
And Matt sort of slides under the table,
220
00:14:46,080 --> 00:14:48,280
I think it was a Tesco carrier bag full,
221
00:14:48,360 --> 00:14:50,880
this big sheaf of documents
about that thick.
222
00:14:50,960 --> 00:14:53,320
And then he explained
this is the Zatarra report.
223
00:14:54,120 --> 00:14:55,720
This is what he's been working on.
224
00:14:55,800 --> 00:14:58,920
There's 120 pages of this stuff.
225
00:14:59,000 --> 00:15:00,920
And the core of the Zatarra allegation
226
00:15:01,000 --> 00:15:06,200
was everyone thinks Wirecard is this
big payment processor doing legit things,
227
00:15:06,280 --> 00:15:10,000
and actually the heart of its business
is laundering money for criminals.
228
00:15:10,080 --> 00:15:12,280
[upbeat music plays]
229
00:15:15,560 --> 00:15:19,920
Money laundering is taking the proceeds
of crime and cleaning the money.
230
00:15:24,280 --> 00:15:27,880
If you rob a bank
and have a big bag full of cash,
231
00:15:27,960 --> 00:15:31,520
you might launder the money by making
it look like you earned the money.
232
00:15:31,600 --> 00:15:34,760
And Wirecard was doing this
for various online businesses,
233
00:15:34,840 --> 00:15:36,840
but the principle is the same.
234
00:15:36,920 --> 00:15:40,080
What Wirecard would do
is if it was contentious,
235
00:15:40,160 --> 00:15:42,080
say like gambling or porn,
236
00:15:42,160 --> 00:15:44,760
miscode the transaction as something else.
237
00:15:44,840 --> 00:15:47,440
Instead of putting a payment
as gambling, it might go,
238
00:15:47,520 --> 00:15:49,400
"Actually, this is a florist."
239
00:15:50,280 --> 00:15:51,720
Wirecard could get away with it
240
00:15:51,800 --> 00:15:55,120
by taking advantage of various
little weaknesses in the system.
241
00:15:56,120 --> 00:15:58,800
[Matthew] All the transactions would come
into the United States
242
00:15:58,880 --> 00:16:01,920
via a UK company called Bluetool,
243
00:16:02,800 --> 00:16:04,480
based in Consett, County Durham.
244
00:16:04,560 --> 00:16:06,560
[mischievous music plays]
245
00:16:08,800 --> 00:16:12,880
Consett is this little,
depressed ex-mining town up on the moors.
246
00:16:13,800 --> 00:16:15,480
[Matthew] Now, you'd think that a company
247
00:16:15,560 --> 00:16:18,720
that is sending hundreds of millions
of dollars over to the US
248
00:16:18,800 --> 00:16:22,400
would have a significant office presence.
249
00:16:23,680 --> 00:16:25,160
This was someone's house.
250
00:16:26,840 --> 00:16:28,200
That seems sort of odd.
251
00:16:29,080 --> 00:16:31,120
[Dan] It is exactly like Ozark.
252
00:16:31,200 --> 00:16:32,480
It's an out-of-the-way place
253
00:16:32,560 --> 00:16:36,120
where they could launder
huge amounts of money.
254
00:16:36,760 --> 00:16:40,400
We were approached
by somebody from up the street
255
00:16:40,480 --> 00:16:42,160
from where we used to live.
256
00:16:42,240 --> 00:16:45,800
And they asked if we just wanted
to have some free money.
257
00:16:45,880 --> 00:16:48,320
They said all you had to do
was to sign your name,
258
00:16:48,400 --> 00:16:50,600
and when you signed your name,
you got 50 quid.
259
00:16:51,840 --> 00:16:54,680
[Dan] The people who were listed
as the directors of these companies
260
00:16:54,760 --> 00:16:56,280
had no idea about them.
261
00:16:56,360 --> 00:17:00,720
But really, that company would be a shell
to hide the real owner,
262
00:17:00,800 --> 00:17:03,200
which was, you know, a gambling website.
263
00:17:04,040 --> 00:17:07,680
I mean, all you were told at the time
was that you would get letters
264
00:17:08,480 --> 00:17:12,080
and all you had to do was post them back,
and that's all we've ever had to do.
265
00:17:13,120 --> 00:17:14,640
[Dan] So you've got a German bank
266
00:17:14,720 --> 00:17:18,480
moving money through the north of England
in this remote, little town
267
00:17:18,560 --> 00:17:22,000
for all these dodgy businesses elsewhere
in the world.
268
00:17:23,440 --> 00:17:28,280
We're talking about maybe
billions of dollars hidden in the shadows.
269
00:17:28,360 --> 00:17:32,440
And it just happened to be this little,
red-brick town in the north of England
270
00:17:32,520 --> 00:17:35,760
was the perfect channel
to make it look legit.
271
00:17:35,840 --> 00:17:38,760
[Matthew] They had literally set up
the whole infrastructure
272
00:17:38,840 --> 00:17:42,240
to permit laundering of money
to take place.
273
00:17:42,920 --> 00:17:46,360
So in my mind,
that rendered Wirecard worthless
274
00:17:46,440 --> 00:17:48,840
because this was an illegal operation.
275
00:17:48,920 --> 00:17:50,920
So yeah. I started shorting the company.
276
00:17:51,000 --> 00:17:53,760
-[tense music plays]
-[sirens wailing]
277
00:17:57,160 --> 00:18:00,240
[Dan] The idea was that I would go away
and do my own work,
278
00:18:00,320 --> 00:18:03,280
and then Matt Earl's Zatarra report
would come out.
279
00:18:03,360 --> 00:18:05,360
And then I could go,
"I've checked all of this."
280
00:18:05,440 --> 00:18:07,320
"Look, there's some interesting parts
from it."
281
00:18:07,400 --> 00:18:10,040
[tense music intensifies]
282
00:18:11,440 --> 00:18:15,000
What I should have said is,
"Matt Earl is a short seller."
283
00:18:15,080 --> 00:18:17,560
These people have bet against
the Wirecard share price,
284
00:18:17,640 --> 00:18:21,000
so they have a big interest
in pushing the price down.
285
00:18:21,080 --> 00:18:22,520
So read it with that in mind.
286
00:18:24,200 --> 00:18:25,760
[tense music ends]
287
00:18:25,840 --> 00:18:28,440
[Matthew] We highlight
the wrongdoings of companies.
288
00:18:28,960 --> 00:18:32,280
And there is, obviously, a profit element
to it because if we're right,
289
00:18:32,360 --> 00:18:35,600
then we make a return
on the capital that we've risked.
290
00:18:37,040 --> 00:18:40,400
[Dan] When the Zatarra report came out,
I sort of dashed back to the office.
291
00:18:40,480 --> 00:18:43,440
I was like, "I've got to tell everyone,
and I want the scoop."
292
00:18:43,960 --> 00:18:46,320
And so I wrote this quick piece.
293
00:18:46,400 --> 00:18:48,200
I was in too much of a hurry,
294
00:18:48,720 --> 00:18:52,120
and I didn't really stop to think
how the whole thing would look.
295
00:18:52,760 --> 00:18:57,360
The Zatarra report had an immediate impact
on Wirecard's share price,
296
00:18:57,440 --> 00:19:03,840
which fell, but it fell a lot further
after Dan published his post,
297
00:19:03,920 --> 00:19:06,280
drawing attention to the Zatarra report.
298
00:19:07,800 --> 00:19:12,800
From that one post,
a billion euros or more just vanish,
299
00:19:13,400 --> 00:19:17,040
and that put us immediately in hot water.
300
00:19:21,160 --> 00:19:24,760
[man] The moment I realized that Wirecard
was going to be a troubling story
301
00:19:24,840 --> 00:19:27,440
was when
the first lawyers' letters came in.
302
00:19:27,520 --> 00:19:31,800
They were raising questions
about the relationship
303
00:19:31,880 --> 00:19:35,640
between Dan and the authors
of the Zatarra report.
304
00:19:35,720 --> 00:19:37,280
And there was this allegation
305
00:19:37,360 --> 00:19:40,320
that somehow Dan was colluding
with short sellers,
306
00:19:40,400 --> 00:19:43,760
people who are essentially betting
against the company's share price.
307
00:19:43,840 --> 00:19:44,680
[inhales]
308
00:19:44,760 --> 00:19:49,200
Uh, that's a pretty serious charge
because it's essentially suggesting
309
00:19:49,280 --> 00:19:52,920
that one of the journalists has been
involved in share-price manipulation.
310
00:19:53,000 --> 00:19:54,000
That's serious.
311
00:19:56,800 --> 00:20:00,640
[Cansel in German] In Germany,
short sellers have a bad reputation.
312
00:20:03,440 --> 00:20:06,760
The perception is because they are betting
on the share price dropping,
313
00:20:06,840 --> 00:20:09,960
they are actively seeking
to destroy companies.
314
00:20:10,040 --> 00:20:13,640
Jobs are lost and that can't be good.
315
00:20:15,320 --> 00:20:18,480
The Zatarra Report
wasn't seen as credible.
316
00:20:18,560 --> 00:20:21,800
The criticism was always,
"What kind of report is this?"
317
00:20:21,880 --> 00:20:24,680
"There isn't enough evidence
to back up its claims."
318
00:20:24,760 --> 00:20:26,560
"It's just mud-slinging
319
00:20:27,760 --> 00:20:31,280
because German companies
do not make mistakes."
320
00:20:33,120 --> 00:20:37,960
It was seen very strongly as an attack
on Germany itself, on German companies.
321
00:20:38,040 --> 00:20:39,760
[tense music plays]
322
00:20:41,040 --> 00:20:45,040
[Paul in English] We were suddenly
under attack from all directions.
323
00:20:46,560 --> 00:20:50,960
We had legal threats coming in,
anonymous phone calls just abusing us.
324
00:20:51,040 --> 00:20:55,480
And it was unlike anything
we'd had previously.
325
00:20:55,560 --> 00:20:56,760
It was relentless.
326
00:20:58,160 --> 00:21:01,160
[Dan] Twitter's just this whole total,
other free-for-all.
327
00:21:02,240 --> 00:21:06,720
So you get people going, "Yeah.
You're a criminal, McCrum. Go to jail."
328
00:21:06,800 --> 00:21:08,760
[camera zooming in]
329
00:21:11,000 --> 00:21:12,880
Then occasionally, there'd be threats.
330
00:21:12,960 --> 00:21:14,520
[siren wailing]
331
00:21:14,600 --> 00:21:17,080
"You're gonna get
what's coming to you," sort of thing.
332
00:21:20,120 --> 00:21:23,560
[Matthew] There was a vehicle
that was parked outside my house
333
00:21:23,640 --> 00:21:25,440
that started following me.
334
00:21:25,520 --> 00:21:28,880
[car engine revving]
335
00:21:28,960 --> 00:21:30,480
It was very unnerving.
336
00:21:34,520 --> 00:21:36,920
I had the license plates noted down,
337
00:21:38,720 --> 00:21:41,200
and that led back
to investigative agencies
338
00:21:41,280 --> 00:21:42,960
that were working for Wirecard.
339
00:21:44,120 --> 00:21:45,200
[camera shutter clicks]
340
00:21:47,280 --> 00:21:51,720
[Lionel] And then one day, Paul says
that somebody's been trying to listen in
341
00:21:51,800 --> 00:21:53,680
to conversations in my office.
342
00:21:55,840 --> 00:21:58,480
I said, "How?"
And he says, "Across the bridge."
343
00:22:02,200 --> 00:22:03,840
He spotted this person.
344
00:22:05,080 --> 00:22:07,040
Unbelievable, with a lookout.
345
00:22:07,560 --> 00:22:09,840
And they got
this highly sensitive listening device
346
00:22:09,920 --> 00:22:11,960
across the Thames into my office.
347
00:22:12,040 --> 00:22:16,000
[suspenseful music plays]
348
00:22:18,200 --> 00:22:20,240
What the bloody hell's going on?
349
00:22:32,840 --> 00:22:35,920
[tense music plays]
350
00:22:36,000 --> 00:22:40,200
[Tobias in German] A few weeks
after I opened the short position,
351
00:22:40,280 --> 00:22:44,520
I got a call from the Wirecard lawyer.
352
00:22:46,240 --> 00:22:49,040
He says, "You are short-selling Wirecard."
353
00:22:49,120 --> 00:22:51,800
I thought, "How did you figure that out?"
354
00:22:53,080 --> 00:22:55,560
He read me all the transactions.
355
00:22:55,640 --> 00:22:58,840
Date, time, amount, rate.
356
00:23:01,760 --> 00:23:05,000
He knew everything.
Then he says, "We need to talk."
357
00:23:06,280 --> 00:23:09,880
He arrived with two thugs.
358
00:23:11,440 --> 00:23:16,560
They looked exactly
as you imagine thugs to be.
359
00:23:16,640 --> 00:23:18,320
Straightaway they pushed me
360
00:23:19,560 --> 00:23:24,440
and punched the wall with full force.
361
00:23:26,440 --> 00:23:29,080
I admit I was really scared.
362
00:23:32,400 --> 00:23:37,440
What company sends a bunch of thugs
to an investor's office?
363
00:23:40,440 --> 00:23:44,040
After that,
I stopped looking into Wirecard.
364
00:23:44,120 --> 00:23:45,040
I let it be.
365
00:23:47,200 --> 00:23:49,800
And no one else looked closely
into Wirecard,
366
00:23:50,640 --> 00:23:53,000
except Dan McCrum.
367
00:23:57,680 --> 00:23:59,880
[Dan in English]
I'd been looking at Wirecard
368
00:23:59,960 --> 00:24:02,560
for a year-and-a-half at that point
when Zatarra came out.
369
00:24:03,280 --> 00:24:04,440
And so I was like,
370
00:24:04,520 --> 00:24:07,960
"Surely regulators, investors
are gonna look at this and go,
371
00:24:08,040 --> 00:24:10,320
'There's so much dirt.
We've got to look into it.'"
372
00:24:11,880 --> 00:24:13,560
But nothing ever came of it.
373
00:24:18,400 --> 00:24:21,760
[Paul] Immediately,
the stock price rebounded.
374
00:24:22,800 --> 00:24:27,120
[in German] My dear shareholders…
375
00:24:28,040 --> 00:24:30,560
[Martin in English] Dr. Braun
had the trust of the employees,
376
00:24:30,640 --> 00:24:32,720
but he never looked relaxed.
377
00:24:34,000 --> 00:24:39,200
He looked like a business consultant
in a room of people having a party.
378
00:24:39,280 --> 00:24:42,040
[in German] …from these added values
for the consumer.
379
00:24:42,120 --> 00:24:44,640
[Martin in English]
But when Dr. Braun was near,
380
00:24:44,720 --> 00:24:47,040
Jan Marsalek was not far away.
381
00:24:47,120 --> 00:24:49,640
[tense music continues]
382
00:24:53,480 --> 00:24:56,360
Jan was hyper-cool.
383
00:24:58,480 --> 00:25:01,360
He was mentored by Dr. Braun.
384
00:25:01,440 --> 00:25:05,000
You had the feeling that Braun was proud
385
00:25:05,080 --> 00:25:08,040
to have a fellow Austrian
that he could mentor
386
00:25:08,120 --> 00:25:11,960
and be his right-hand guy
within the company.
387
00:25:15,280 --> 00:25:17,920
Well, if I find a weak spot, but I'm…
388
00:25:18,440 --> 00:25:20,800
[Martin] Jan just oozed confidence.
389
00:25:21,880 --> 00:25:25,400
He had very strong command of situations.
390
00:25:25,480 --> 00:25:27,560
It's not working. It's not cold enough.
391
00:25:27,640 --> 00:25:33,960
I didn't have a quarter of the confidence
that he had at a snip of a finger.
392
00:25:34,040 --> 00:25:36,480
Wirecard does not operate as an acquirer.
393
00:25:36,560 --> 00:25:38,720
Um, it can work with partners
in the background.
394
00:25:40,240 --> 00:25:44,480
[Martin] When you ask him if he had
a few minutes of his valuable time,
395
00:25:44,560 --> 00:25:47,080
he would always say, "For you, always."
396
00:25:47,960 --> 00:25:49,880
But he would say that to almost everyone.
397
00:25:53,200 --> 00:25:55,320
[man in German]
Marsalek is a completely different type.
398
00:25:55,400 --> 00:25:58,440
Extremely charming,
399
00:25:58,520 --> 00:26:02,440
very approachable, a great communicator.
400
00:26:03,040 --> 00:26:05,880
Everything Braun didn't have,
Marsalek had,
401
00:26:05,960 --> 00:26:08,320
which is why they were a great team.
402
00:26:10,800 --> 00:26:15,480
I think that very few people knew
who Jan Marsalek really was.
403
00:26:17,720 --> 00:26:20,520
He is certainly
at the center of this scandal.
404
00:26:20,600 --> 00:26:24,320
He is the one
who made sure that the turnover
405
00:26:24,400 --> 00:26:28,000
was always the way his boss,
Braun, wanted.
406
00:26:29,040 --> 00:26:31,040
[tense music intensifies]
407
00:26:37,720 --> 00:26:41,560
[reporter] The German Stock Exchange
is richer because of one company.
408
00:26:41,640 --> 00:26:45,080
The payment-processing company,
Wirecard, from Aschheim near Munich
409
00:26:45,160 --> 00:26:47,800
has made the leap
into the stock market premier league.
410
00:26:49,400 --> 00:26:53,280
Wirecard's share price last year
was €77.40.
411
00:26:53,360 --> 00:26:57,040
Today it stands at €189.40.
412
00:26:57,120 --> 00:27:00,400
[Markus] Our figures tell a story
of strong growth.
413
00:27:00,480 --> 00:27:04,440
How our business is valued
is a question for the investors.
414
00:27:05,240 --> 00:27:08,680
Wirecard has shaken up
the German stock exchange this week
415
00:27:08,760 --> 00:27:12,080
and kicked the Commerzbank
out of the elite DAX index.
416
00:27:13,880 --> 00:27:16,200
[in English] It's about
making the cake much bigger.
417
00:27:16,280 --> 00:27:19,760
I'm in the business
of making the cake much bigger.
418
00:27:19,840 --> 00:27:23,400
I've got a German CEO here
of the company Wirecard.
419
00:27:23,480 --> 00:27:25,920
Um, and today, Markus Braun,
420
00:27:26,000 --> 00:27:28,360
you guys are gonna replace
Commerzbank, in the DAX.
421
00:27:28,440 --> 00:27:32,120
You're gonna be one of the big companies
on the benchmark index here.
422
00:27:32,200 --> 00:27:33,600
What does that mean to you?
423
00:27:33,680 --> 00:27:36,240
I think it brings a lot
of awareness, positive awareness.
424
00:27:36,320 --> 00:27:37,880
Uh, it's good for investors.
425
00:27:37,960 --> 00:27:42,440
But of course, in operative terms,
it doesn't change our strong strategy.
426
00:27:43,200 --> 00:27:45,960
[Lena in German] A lot of investors
believe in German values,
427
00:27:46,040 --> 00:27:48,760
and now it has the DAX seal of approval.
428
00:27:48,840 --> 00:27:51,200
So a lot of people thought a DAX company
429
00:27:51,280 --> 00:27:56,680
would be tightly regulated
by the German authorities.
430
00:27:57,600 --> 00:28:00,400
Who wouldn't be thrilled
to have money invested in Wirecard?
431
00:28:01,360 --> 00:28:03,360
[sirens wailing]
432
00:28:07,720 --> 00:28:09,440
[Paul in English] Wirecard, at the time,
433
00:28:09,520 --> 00:28:12,840
was a big talking point
throughout the London market.
434
00:28:12,920 --> 00:28:17,360
We'd had legal complaints,
but we brushed them off.
435
00:28:18,560 --> 00:28:23,640
A while later, I was having lunch
with one of my stock-market sources,
436
00:28:23,720 --> 00:28:25,640
and Wirecard came up.
437
00:28:26,360 --> 00:28:30,320
He said, "You know
that they will pay you a lot of money
438
00:28:30,400 --> 00:28:32,160
to stop writing about them."
439
00:28:32,240 --> 00:28:35,320
And I laughed,
and I said, "Don't be stupid."
440
00:28:35,400 --> 00:28:37,120
He said, "No, no, no. Definitely."
441
00:28:37,200 --> 00:28:40,840
"They will pay you good money
not to write about them."
442
00:28:41,680 --> 00:28:44,680
And he said, "Look. Go and talk to Gary."
443
00:28:44,760 --> 00:28:46,240
[upbeat music plays]
444
00:28:46,320 --> 00:28:48,040
-Gary and Tom.
-Gary. I'm Tom.
445
00:28:50,160 --> 00:28:52,880
-What's with the glasses?
-[director] Best without glasses.
446
00:28:52,960 --> 00:28:54,880
Is it? I thought they look cool.
447
00:28:56,400 --> 00:28:57,800
[laughs]
448
00:28:58,760 --> 00:29:02,480
[Paul] Gary is a great, old mate,
very active trader.
449
00:29:03,120 --> 00:29:05,880
You know, he had a good ear
for what was happening.
450
00:29:05,960 --> 00:29:07,280
And he basically said,
451
00:29:07,360 --> 00:29:10,440
"What's this stuff
you've been writing about Wirecard?"
452
00:29:10,520 --> 00:29:12,400
"Are you sure it's right?"
453
00:29:12,480 --> 00:29:17,160
And Gary says, "'Cause I've got
a guy here who says it's all wrong."
454
00:29:17,240 --> 00:29:19,360
"Actually, he wants to talk to you."
455
00:29:19,880 --> 00:29:22,480
And I said, "Well, who is it?"
456
00:29:22,560 --> 00:29:25,200
"It's a guy called Jan Marsalek."
457
00:29:25,280 --> 00:29:26,800
[tense music plays]
458
00:29:27,960 --> 00:29:30,600
I could've fallen off my chair.
459
00:29:32,480 --> 00:29:34,960
You know,
Gary was a confidential source of mine.
460
00:29:35,920 --> 00:29:39,080
How did Marsalek find out
that we knew each other?
461
00:29:42,360 --> 00:29:45,920
It would have been around 2017.
462
00:29:47,600 --> 00:29:51,400
One of my good friends came into the bar
where I usually get my breakfast
463
00:29:51,480 --> 00:29:54,600
and had a little Post-It note
with a number on,
464
00:29:54,680 --> 00:29:56,280
and a name, Jan Marsalek,
465
00:29:56,360 --> 00:30:00,200
and said, "Can you call this fella?
It will be worth your while."
466
00:30:01,480 --> 00:30:04,680
Didn't know what it meant at the time.
It's odd, but we might make some money.
467
00:30:04,760 --> 00:30:06,400
We'll have a try.
468
00:30:07,040 --> 00:30:08,760
So I phoned up and he said to me,
469
00:30:08,840 --> 00:30:12,680
"Look. I'm prepared to pay you
a very substantial amount of money
470
00:30:12,760 --> 00:30:16,200
to introduce me
to your good friend, Paul Murphy."
471
00:30:18,120 --> 00:30:19,960
I said, "I'll talk to Paul."
472
00:30:20,600 --> 00:30:24,640
[Paul] Gary says, "This guy,
Jan Marsalek, is desperate to meet you."
473
00:30:24,720 --> 00:30:29,720
"He will get on a plane and come to London
for lunch at the drop of a hat."
474
00:30:30,320 --> 00:30:33,400
The immediate thought
was this is some sort of setup.
475
00:30:33,480 --> 00:30:37,040
Because it's such a strange,
uh, thing to happen.
476
00:30:37,560 --> 00:30:39,080
So I said yes to the lunch.
477
00:30:43,280 --> 00:30:47,640
Basically, we wanted to see
whether Marsalek would offer me money
478
00:30:47,720 --> 00:30:50,120
to stop writing about Wirecard.
479
00:30:50,720 --> 00:30:51,720
That was the plan.
480
00:30:56,600 --> 00:30:59,600
I was introduced to Jan Marsalek
for the first time.
481
00:31:01,480 --> 00:31:04,320
He was obviously very sharp,
482
00:31:04,400 --> 00:31:07,560
very careful in what he said.
483
00:31:09,440 --> 00:31:10,800
[Gary] On first impressions,
484
00:31:10,880 --> 00:31:15,840
I was looking at a very well-dressed,
articulate, straight-talking man.
485
00:31:17,080 --> 00:31:19,680
[Tom] It was the Financial Times
versus Wirecard.
486
00:31:19,760 --> 00:31:23,000
They were trying to find
any sort of information on Wirecard.
487
00:31:23,080 --> 00:31:25,600
And then Wirecard were trying
to find information back.
488
00:31:26,640 --> 00:31:28,040
[Paul] It was quite awkward.
489
00:31:29,320 --> 00:31:33,240
He talked at length
about how he had direct experience
490
00:31:33,320 --> 00:31:38,080
of journalists who were taking bribes
to write negative articles.
491
00:31:38,880 --> 00:31:43,240
I told him I'd never accepted a bribe,
492
00:31:43,320 --> 00:31:45,280
and he said, "I know that, Paul."
493
00:31:45,360 --> 00:31:48,120
"I've seen evidence
that you've never accepted a bribe."
494
00:31:48,200 --> 00:31:51,200
And I thought,
"Ah, you've been through my bank account."
495
00:31:51,280 --> 00:31:52,440
Uh, and he clearly had.
496
00:31:54,960 --> 00:31:56,520
I kind of realized, at that point,
497
00:31:56,600 --> 00:32:01,480
that he wasn't going to suddenly offer me
a bag of cash there at the table.
498
00:32:01,560 --> 00:32:03,720
There were too many people
around the table.
499
00:32:03,800 --> 00:32:05,800
[suspenseful music plays]
500
00:32:06,800 --> 00:32:10,680
[Gary] It ended in Jan saying,
"I'm very happy that Paul's listened."
501
00:32:10,760 --> 00:32:12,880
Paul said,
"We're gonna draw a line under this,
502
00:32:12,960 --> 00:32:15,800
and FT will not keep regurgitating
this old stuff."
503
00:32:15,880 --> 00:32:18,720
"However, if there's new stuff,
504
00:32:18,800 --> 00:32:19,880
we will nail you."
505
00:32:20,520 --> 00:32:22,160
And Jan was smiling.
506
00:32:23,120 --> 00:32:26,600
[hesitates] "That's not gonna happen
because we're doing nothing wrong."
507
00:32:27,960 --> 00:32:32,600
At that point,
I negotiated a fee for my PR.
508
00:32:33,120 --> 00:32:37,200
I asked for a set fee of 500,000 euros.
509
00:32:37,280 --> 00:32:43,680
He settled
on 32-and-a-half thousand euros a month
510
00:32:43,760 --> 00:32:44,680
for six months,
511
00:32:44,760 --> 00:32:47,760
but said, "Look. Can you keep me
in contact with the short sellers,
512
00:32:47,840 --> 00:32:49,520
just so I know what's going on?"
513
00:32:49,600 --> 00:32:52,560
And I felt a little bit like
a double agent, but Paul knew,
514
00:32:52,640 --> 00:32:53,960
and Jan knew.
515
00:32:55,760 --> 00:32:58,920
[suspenseful music intensifies]
516
00:33:00,400 --> 00:33:02,560
[Fahmi] I launched
Safkhet Capital Management
517
00:33:02,640 --> 00:33:04,280
in January of 2018.
518
00:33:05,280 --> 00:33:08,520
We were just doing our own research,
looking for opportunities,
519
00:33:08,600 --> 00:33:12,360
and a name
that came up consistently was Wirecard.
520
00:33:12,880 --> 00:33:17,520
Because, finally, Wirecard is making
its first foray onto US soil.
521
00:33:18,400 --> 00:33:19,760
[woman speaks ad copy]
522
00:33:25,720 --> 00:33:29,360
Over 20-plus years, we've emerged
as a leader in payment solutions
523
00:33:29,440 --> 00:33:31,160
in North America and beyond.
524
00:33:31,240 --> 00:33:33,320
[Fahmi] What was new at that time
was the fact
525
00:33:33,400 --> 00:33:37,760
that Wirecard had acquired Citi's
North American prepaid-card business.
526
00:33:38,800 --> 00:33:43,600
Prepaid cards are a very effective way
of laundering cash internationally,
527
00:33:43,680 --> 00:33:45,480
including dirty money.
528
00:33:47,040 --> 00:33:49,800
You don't need to put your name
on the card or open a bank account.
529
00:33:49,880 --> 00:33:52,800
You can just have a card
with the Wirecard logo.
530
00:33:52,880 --> 00:33:56,920
The amount of criminal activity
that could go on is alarming.
531
00:33:57,440 --> 00:34:01,440
[Fahmi] That was something
that we wanted to really dig into
532
00:34:01,520 --> 00:34:06,200
and see if there was anything that related
to these allegations in Zatarra
533
00:34:06,720 --> 00:34:09,400
that would now be occurring
on American soil.
534
00:34:09,480 --> 00:34:11,840
[suspenseful music continues]
535
00:34:13,120 --> 00:34:16,080
Wirecard's offices
were in Conshohocken, Pennsylvania,
536
00:34:16,160 --> 00:34:18,000
which is two hours from New York City.
537
00:34:18,080 --> 00:34:21,440
So we decided
why not just drive over there
538
00:34:21,520 --> 00:34:23,280
in Christina's beat-up…
539
00:34:23,360 --> 00:34:25,320
[laughs] …little Volkswagen?
540
00:34:34,800 --> 00:34:36,680
[Fahmi] We saw the Wirecard signs,
541
00:34:36,760 --> 00:34:39,120
and then there was no security,
542
00:34:39,200 --> 00:34:40,640
so we just walked up the stairs.
543
00:34:40,720 --> 00:34:43,400
[camera shutter clicking]
544
00:34:44,120 --> 00:34:45,440
It was very large.
545
00:34:45,520 --> 00:34:48,240
Really, it should maybe fit 600 people…
546
00:34:48,320 --> 00:34:51,000
-A lot, yes.
-…but there were maybe 30 people.
547
00:34:51,880 --> 00:34:53,680
And then they asked us what we wanted,
548
00:34:53,760 --> 00:34:57,760
and we said that we wanted to speak
to someone about buying prepaid cards.
549
00:34:57,840 --> 00:35:02,880
He assured me that it's all very easy,
I could give those cards to who I wanted.
550
00:35:02,960 --> 00:35:04,000
It's not a problem.
551
00:35:04,080 --> 00:35:08,280
And then he said I could even get cards
up to $150,000
552
00:35:09,480 --> 00:35:11,000
on a single card.
553
00:35:12,680 --> 00:35:15,040
This was a massive shock.
554
00:35:15,120 --> 00:35:17,200
And when we checked on the dark web
555
00:35:17,280 --> 00:35:20,600
to buy prepaid cards that are
being resold on the dark web,
556
00:35:20,680 --> 00:35:23,040
the most you can get is $10,000.
557
00:35:24,720 --> 00:35:28,720
Fall of 2018,
where I finally just pinged Dan McCrum.
558
00:35:28,800 --> 00:35:30,080
[phone chimes]
559
00:35:30,680 --> 00:35:33,880
And said, "Hey.
We're looking at Wirecard in the US."
560
00:35:34,880 --> 00:35:36,560
"I think we have something here."
561
00:35:37,920 --> 00:35:40,000
[phone rings]
562
00:35:41,840 --> 00:35:44,280
[Dan] Fahmi wasn't
the only short seller who contacted me
563
00:35:44,360 --> 00:35:46,200
after Wirecard entered the DAX.
564
00:35:46,840 --> 00:35:49,800
I was bombarded
with ideas by short sellers.
565
00:35:49,880 --> 00:35:52,120
Some of them were obsessed
with money laundering.
566
00:35:52,200 --> 00:35:55,440
Others were convinced
that Wirecard's business couldn't be real.
567
00:35:55,520 --> 00:35:57,080
[phone rings]
568
00:35:57,160 --> 00:35:59,960
The problem was
that none of them had any proof.
569
00:36:00,040 --> 00:36:03,640
They were all theories,
but then-- when was it?
570
00:36:03,720 --> 00:36:07,720
Sort of one Monday morning in October,
I get this funny email from Singapore.
571
00:36:07,800 --> 00:36:08,960
[tense music plays]
572
00:36:09,040 --> 00:36:12,120
Criminal behavior
at a big financial company.
573
00:36:13,000 --> 00:36:13,960
Wirecard.
574
00:36:15,760 --> 00:36:18,680
And so I get in touch
with Stefania Palma in Singapore.
575
00:36:18,760 --> 00:36:20,760
[tense music continues]
576
00:36:27,280 --> 00:36:31,800
[Stefania] In Singapore,
Wirecard was just absolutely pervasive.
577
00:36:32,320 --> 00:36:35,640
Thousands of shops,
and merchants, and hotels
578
00:36:35,720 --> 00:36:38,760
were using Wirecard's card machines.
579
00:36:41,440 --> 00:36:44,800
Dan became aware
that there was a potential whistleblower
580
00:36:44,880 --> 00:36:46,880
who had a lot of information
581
00:36:46,960 --> 00:36:49,920
and was very keen
to speak to us as soon as possible.
582
00:36:57,440 --> 00:37:00,680
The first meeting was at Changi Airport.
583
00:37:01,760 --> 00:37:04,840
Going in,
I knew very little of who I was meeting.
584
00:37:04,920 --> 00:37:07,600
I was definitely very cautious.
585
00:37:09,920 --> 00:37:12,360
I found out his real name is Pav.
586
00:37:14,120 --> 00:37:17,480
He'd been the head of legal
for Asia at Wirecard.
587
00:37:17,560 --> 00:37:19,760
He had recently left the company
588
00:37:19,840 --> 00:37:24,640
and was full of frustration and anger
589
00:37:24,720 --> 00:37:27,960
in terms of what he had witnessed.
590
00:37:29,000 --> 00:37:33,960
It was an extremely intense conversation
that lasted hours.
591
00:37:34,040 --> 00:37:40,320
I realized the overwhelming volume
of information that he had.
592
00:37:40,920 --> 00:37:44,120
-[phone rings]
-I immediately gave Dan a call and said,
593
00:37:44,200 --> 00:37:46,640
"This could be immense for us."
594
00:37:46,720 --> 00:37:49,600
[laughs] "I hope
that all of this checks out
595
00:37:49,680 --> 00:37:53,000
because if it does,
we're just sitting on gold."
596
00:37:53,560 --> 00:37:54,880
[Dan] Okay. Holy shit.
597
00:37:54,960 --> 00:37:58,080
This sounds like the real deal.
I think I need to come to Singapore.
598
00:37:58,160 --> 00:38:00,160
[suspenseful music plays]
599
00:38:09,600 --> 00:38:12,960
We met out in the open
underneath Wirecard's old building.
600
00:38:13,960 --> 00:38:18,280
We were extremely paranoid
about Wirecard's hacking capabilities.
601
00:38:19,560 --> 00:38:23,080
We sort of relied on the fact
that the fountain covered the noise.
602
00:38:24,760 --> 00:38:28,440
And he literally starts drawing diagrams
of how Wirecard works
603
00:38:28,520 --> 00:38:30,040
and who the people are.
604
00:38:31,040 --> 00:38:33,960
And then he explained
how he started working for Wirecard,
605
00:38:34,040 --> 00:38:37,160
he gets contacted
by this woman on the finance team,
606
00:38:37,240 --> 00:38:39,480
and she tells him this incredible story.
607
00:38:41,360 --> 00:38:44,480
She'd been called into a room
in the Wirecard offices
608
00:38:44,560 --> 00:38:46,120
with the rest of the finance team.
609
00:38:46,200 --> 00:38:49,360
And her boss is this Indonesian guy
called Edo Kurniawan.
610
00:38:50,040 --> 00:38:52,840
And he's really young
for the job. He's only 33.
611
00:38:52,920 --> 00:38:56,240
And if you looked at his CV,
there's basically nothing there.
612
00:38:56,320 --> 00:38:59,360
But somehow he's running
the Asian finance team,
613
00:38:59,440 --> 00:39:00,800
and that is, by the way,
614
00:39:00,880 --> 00:39:03,560
a very significant portion
of Wirecard's business.
615
00:39:04,600 --> 00:39:07,040
So this woman goes into the meeting,
616
00:39:07,120 --> 00:39:11,160
and suddenly, what Edo does,
is he starts drawing on a whiteboard.
617
00:39:11,240 --> 00:39:14,000
And he's explaining
how they're gonna cook the books.
618
00:39:14,080 --> 00:39:16,160
Almost like that scene where they're like,
619
00:39:16,240 --> 00:39:18,480
"Here's the bank
and you guys will go in here,
620
00:39:18,560 --> 00:39:20,480
and the van will be waiting outside."
621
00:39:20,560 --> 00:39:21,760
Like a bank job.
622
00:39:21,840 --> 00:39:26,040
And so she goes and tells Pav,
the lawyer in Singapore, about it.
623
00:39:26,760 --> 00:39:29,640
Immediately Pav says,
"Right. We better look into this."
624
00:39:30,360 --> 00:39:31,680
Within a matter of weeks,
625
00:39:31,760 --> 00:39:34,560
there's a full-blown
internal investigation going on.
626
00:39:34,640 --> 00:39:36,640
[suspenseful music continues]
627
00:39:38,640 --> 00:39:41,160
None of Wirecard's top brass
know anything about it.
628
00:39:41,240 --> 00:39:44,960
And they start finding
all of these dodgy transactions.
629
00:39:45,480 --> 00:39:50,680
So, Pav put together this presentation
for the key guys in Germany.
630
00:39:51,760 --> 00:39:53,200
"Look at what we found."
631
00:39:55,720 --> 00:39:58,280
Suddenly the message comes back
from Munich,
632
00:39:58,360 --> 00:40:00,400
"Good work, guys.
We'll take it from here."
633
00:40:02,000 --> 00:40:04,840
"Yeah. So we're gonna put Jan Marsalek
in charge of it."
634
00:40:06,800 --> 00:40:10,600
It becomes clear very soon
that nothing's gonna happen.
635
00:40:12,640 --> 00:40:14,960
And then Pav gets forced out,
636
00:40:15,040 --> 00:40:20,040
but he takes copies
of the inbox of this guy Edo
637
00:40:21,320 --> 00:40:22,480
and gives it to us.
638
00:40:24,520 --> 00:40:26,040
Seventy gigs worth of data.
639
00:40:35,160 --> 00:40:37,680
[camera shutter clicking]
640
00:40:38,320 --> 00:40:42,640
As soon as I got back from Singapore,
we knew we had to think about security.
641
00:40:43,160 --> 00:40:45,240
[camera shutter clicking]
642
00:40:46,760 --> 00:40:50,680
[Paul] We were very aware
that Wirecard was spying on us.
643
00:40:52,880 --> 00:40:55,200
Dan had to operate in complete secrecy.
644
00:40:56,520 --> 00:40:59,320
[Dan] We were basically acting
on the basis
645
00:40:59,960 --> 00:41:02,200
that anything on the FT network
646
00:41:02,280 --> 00:41:04,240
was at risk of being compromised.
647
00:41:06,160 --> 00:41:09,160
[Paul] We got Dan set up
with an air-gapped laptop,
648
00:41:09,240 --> 00:41:13,000
which had the modem ripped out
so that it can't be hacked.
649
00:41:14,200 --> 00:41:20,640
So this pile of documents from Pav,
that went on the super-secure laptop.
650
00:41:21,160 --> 00:41:24,080
So every morning, I have to sign out
the key to the big safe.
651
00:41:24,600 --> 00:41:28,520
The key was about that long, which
gives you a sense of how big the safe was.
652
00:41:28,600 --> 00:41:30,000
It was like a giant fridge.
653
00:41:31,360 --> 00:41:34,480
Get out the laptop
and the files that I'm working on,
654
00:41:36,280 --> 00:41:38,200
then go into my own little bunker.
655
00:41:38,720 --> 00:41:42,280
A little room
in the middle of the building in the FT…
656
00:41:44,200 --> 00:41:46,560
and start going
through the material we've got.
657
00:41:47,080 --> 00:41:49,520
[suspenseful music plays]
658
00:41:55,600 --> 00:41:58,200
Six weeks of every day,
laptop out the safe,
659
00:41:59,000 --> 00:42:02,680
go through all the emails, print them off,
try and work out what's going on.
660
00:42:04,160 --> 00:42:07,320
Okay, right. That's the time.
Close it down again. Back in the safe.
661
00:42:08,160 --> 00:42:10,600
-Start again the next day.
-[train brakes screeching]
662
00:42:14,120 --> 00:42:16,880
I was just following trails
through the emails.
663
00:42:19,920 --> 00:42:24,160
Sticking keyword searches
into Outlook, like "India," "Marsalek."
664
00:42:25,600 --> 00:42:28,560
I had been puzzling
about this company for years
665
00:42:28,640 --> 00:42:29,480
and suddenly…
666
00:42:31,000 --> 00:42:32,480
it was like I was inside.
667
00:42:38,440 --> 00:42:40,960
I was also trying to get Jan Marsalek.
668
00:42:43,120 --> 00:42:44,200
I'd never met him.
669
00:42:44,280 --> 00:42:47,200
I'd never spoken to him,
but I knew he was the enemy.
670
00:42:48,920 --> 00:42:52,520
I just was looking
for anything to try and tie him
671
00:42:52,600 --> 00:42:54,160
to what had happened in Singapore.
672
00:42:58,440 --> 00:43:01,080
I could sort of see
he was always at the edge of it.
673
00:43:01,160 --> 00:43:04,600
Like he was involved,
but I couldn't quite prove it.
674
00:43:04,680 --> 00:43:06,680
[suspenseful music intensifies]
675
00:43:08,520 --> 00:43:13,240
But what we can do is we can boil it
just down to Edo Kurniawan,
676
00:43:13,320 --> 00:43:15,480
this guy in the finance team.
677
00:43:16,640 --> 00:43:18,680
[suspenseful music ends]
678
00:43:18,760 --> 00:43:22,880
But if Wirecard had fired this guy,
Edo, then we didn't have a story.
679
00:43:25,880 --> 00:43:28,280
[phone dials]
680
00:43:32,200 --> 00:43:38,440
[Dan talks]
681
00:43:38,920 --> 00:43:40,040
[Edo talks]
682
00:43:40,120 --> 00:43:42,600
[Dan talks]
683
00:43:52,600 --> 00:43:54,080
[Edo talks]
684
00:44:04,440 --> 00:44:05,480
[Dan talks]
685
00:44:05,560 --> 00:44:06,400
[Edo talks]
686
00:44:08,240 --> 00:44:11,400
[Dan] Edo was there,
and he was working on the audit.
687
00:44:11,480 --> 00:44:12,800
It had to be a cover-up.
688
00:44:12,880 --> 00:44:14,840
[uptempo tense music plays]
689
00:44:21,360 --> 00:44:22,880
[Dan] It goes up online.
690
00:44:24,480 --> 00:44:27,560
Within seconds,
the Wirecard share price crashes.
691
00:44:27,640 --> 00:44:29,560
In the space of three days,
692
00:44:29,640 --> 00:44:33,440
we've knocked eight billion euros
off the value of the company.
693
00:44:33,960 --> 00:44:35,360
Holy shit. The story's working.
694
00:44:36,000 --> 00:44:38,520
[Stefania] That was the first moment
695
00:44:38,600 --> 00:44:42,600
where I felt
that this could get really ugly.
696
00:44:42,680 --> 00:44:44,400
[uptempo tense music ends]
697
00:44:51,360 --> 00:44:57,120
[Florian in German] I only heard about
the Financial Times' coverage secondhand.
698
00:44:57,200 --> 00:44:58,280
NEW ATTACK ON WIRECARD
699
00:44:58,360 --> 00:45:00,000
It was the typical bias.
700
00:45:00,080 --> 00:45:04,000
They said, "It is a foreign conspiracy
against a German company."
701
00:45:04,080 --> 00:45:07,160
"A German company is the victim
and must be protected."
702
00:45:09,000 --> 00:45:13,120
Wirecard had hired
a famous lawyer in Bavaria.
703
00:45:15,280 --> 00:45:20,440
The lawyer said
to the public prosecutor, Baumler-Hosl,
704
00:45:20,520 --> 00:45:24,160
that Wirecard is under attack
by short sellers
705
00:45:24,240 --> 00:45:26,320
and its very existence is in jeopardy.
706
00:45:27,120 --> 00:45:31,040
[Lena] Hildegard Baumler-Hosl contacted
the German financial regulator.
707
00:45:31,120 --> 00:45:35,520
The regulator BaFin then said,
"We need to protect Wirecard."
708
00:45:35,600 --> 00:45:39,040
And banned short-selling
of Wirecard shares.
709
00:45:39,120 --> 00:45:44,040
And even filed criminal charges
against Dan McCrum and Stefania Palma.
710
00:45:48,280 --> 00:45:52,120
[in English] And I was shocked,
and I called Dan immediately and I said,
711
00:45:52,200 --> 00:45:55,000
"Dan, what the hell is going on?
What is this?"
712
00:45:55,080 --> 00:45:57,120
[tense music plays]
713
00:45:57,200 --> 00:45:59,200
[Dan] BaFin,
the German Financial Regulator,
714
00:45:59,280 --> 00:46:00,320
comes out and goes,
715
00:46:00,400 --> 00:46:02,840
"We're going to look
into market manipulation."
716
00:46:04,840 --> 00:46:06,520
What does that mean that they have?
717
00:46:06,600 --> 00:46:10,440
Because we haven't been contacted by them,
we didn't know what the evidence was.
718
00:46:10,520 --> 00:46:14,120
So it's like, "Well, okay.
What's been cooked up to say I'm a crook?"
719
00:46:14,200 --> 00:46:17,360
Because I just don't understand
what's happening here.
720
00:46:17,440 --> 00:46:23,040
I think at the very beginning,
I just truly could not believe that
721
00:46:23,120 --> 00:46:27,400
after all the work we'd done,
that we would become the targets.
722
00:46:29,960 --> 00:46:32,720
When you have the regulator one of
723
00:46:32,800 --> 00:46:34,880
the most powerful financial markets
in Europe
724
00:46:34,960 --> 00:46:38,600
sending a very clear sign
that they're coming for you,
725
00:46:38,680 --> 00:46:41,360
you can either let that get to you,
726
00:46:41,440 --> 00:46:46,280
or you try to sort of channel
all that rage and frustration
727
00:46:46,360 --> 00:46:47,840
into the investigation,
728
00:46:47,920 --> 00:46:51,640
really hitting the story, you know,
the hardest you ever have.
729
00:46:52,840 --> 00:46:55,480
And I think you know
which option we went for.
730
00:46:55,560 --> 00:46:58,480
[suspenseful music plays]
731
00:47:04,680 --> 00:47:07,800
[Dan] I'm back in London in the bunker,
carrying on working.
732
00:47:08,560 --> 00:47:11,360
I'd been looking
through Wirecard's customers,
733
00:47:11,440 --> 00:47:14,600
and I started to realize
hundreds of millions of euros
734
00:47:14,680 --> 00:47:16,080
of Wirecard's business
735
00:47:16,800 --> 00:47:19,280
were provided
by just these three partners.
736
00:47:20,840 --> 00:47:24,880
Al Alam, Senjo, and PayEasy.
737
00:47:25,960 --> 00:47:29,320
[Stefania] At that point in time,
these three partner businesses contributed
738
00:47:29,400 --> 00:47:33,360
to something
like half of Wirecard's global sales.
739
00:47:33,440 --> 00:47:36,160
One of these partner businesses
was in the Philippines.
740
00:47:36,240 --> 00:47:38,400
Uh, a business called PayEasy.
741
00:47:38,480 --> 00:47:40,480
[suspenseful music intensifies]
742
00:47:46,760 --> 00:47:52,160
[Dan] On paper, PayEasy was
this very important business to Wirecard.
743
00:47:52,240 --> 00:47:55,560
We say to Stefania, "We need to find out
what is going on. Is this real?"
744
00:47:57,800 --> 00:48:02,840
[Stefania] I remember going to this office
covered with logos of both PayEasy
745
00:48:02,920 --> 00:48:06,320
and a bus company called Fröhlich Tours.
746
00:48:10,360 --> 00:48:12,560
There were drivers coming in and out.
747
00:48:12,640 --> 00:48:15,320
It was clear
that the day-to-day operations
748
00:48:15,400 --> 00:48:17,640
were, in fact, just the bus company.
749
00:48:18,720 --> 00:48:20,920
This looks fishy.
750
00:48:24,520 --> 00:48:27,200
I ended up driving
three hours north of Manila
751
00:48:27,280 --> 00:48:30,880
in this region
that is actually famous for rice fields,
752
00:48:32,080 --> 00:48:36,680
chasing after a company called ConePay,
another partner business for Wirecard.
753
00:48:40,480 --> 00:48:43,120
And we finally find this address.
754
00:48:44,720 --> 00:48:45,960
Someone's house.
755
00:48:46,920 --> 00:48:49,320
[suspenseful music ends]
756
00:48:49,400 --> 00:48:51,840
This middle-aged man opened the door,
757
00:48:51,920 --> 00:48:57,200
and the first thing I see is a table
with a brown Pomeranian
758
00:48:58,360 --> 00:49:00,480
and a small white dog.
759
00:49:01,800 --> 00:49:04,520
There were a couple
of middle-aged Filipino men
760
00:49:04,600 --> 00:49:07,400
who were just grooming
these dogs. [laughs]
761
00:49:07,480 --> 00:49:11,360
Is this the headquarters
of a payments company? [laughs]
762
00:49:13,200 --> 00:49:16,920
It was obvious we were standing
in the middle of a family home,
763
00:49:17,000 --> 00:49:19,840
at which point someone remembers,
764
00:49:19,920 --> 00:49:22,600
"Wait. We got this in the mail,"
765
00:49:22,680 --> 00:49:25,640
and they hand me an envelope.
766
00:49:27,000 --> 00:49:31,960
I take the paper out and immediately see
Wirecard Bank letterhead,
767
00:49:33,120 --> 00:49:34,160
ConePay,
768
00:49:35,320 --> 00:49:37,680
and the address where we were standing.
769
00:49:39,320 --> 00:49:42,160
I froze completely, and I remember shaking
770
00:49:42,240 --> 00:49:47,040
because I knew at that point
that we had cracked the whole thing.
771
00:49:49,840 --> 00:49:51,560
[uptempo suspenseful music plays]
772
00:49:55,120 --> 00:49:57,800
[Dan] I'd spent years trying
to solve this puzzle.
773
00:50:00,400 --> 00:50:03,160
What is the deal with Wirecard's business?
774
00:50:03,240 --> 00:50:05,280
Is it doing all this money laundering?
775
00:50:06,080 --> 00:50:07,720
Is it juicing its profits?
776
00:50:09,920 --> 00:50:11,520
And suddenly, you're like,
777
00:50:12,760 --> 00:50:13,840
"Holy shit."
778
00:50:14,360 --> 00:50:17,360
"The whole thing's fake.
None of it's real."
779
00:50:17,960 --> 00:50:19,920
It's just this incredible bluff.
780
00:50:22,080 --> 00:50:24,160
[uptempo suspenseful music intensifies]
781
00:50:26,400 --> 00:50:28,720
They came up with this deepfake…
782
00:50:31,520 --> 00:50:34,360
where they were using
these three business partners
783
00:50:34,440 --> 00:50:36,640
to just invent a whole load of business.
784
00:50:38,000 --> 00:50:40,800
From the outside,
it looked like a real company.
785
00:50:40,880 --> 00:50:43,040
Thousands of people
thought they were working
786
00:50:43,120 --> 00:50:45,360
on a legitimate enterprise.
787
00:50:45,960 --> 00:50:47,440
It was the emperor's new clothes.
788
00:50:50,800 --> 00:50:52,800
[reporter 1] There's been a fresh report
from the FT,
789
00:50:52,880 --> 00:50:56,280
and they're talking
about half of your worldwide revenue
790
00:50:56,360 --> 00:50:58,920
and almost all of your reported profits
791
00:50:59,000 --> 00:51:03,080
effectively coming
from three opaque partner companies
792
00:51:03,160 --> 00:51:04,240
in recent years.
793
00:51:04,320 --> 00:51:08,320
We do not get distracted
by all of this noise.
794
00:51:08,400 --> 00:51:11,840
[in German] This financial thriller
continues with the latest punch-up
795
00:51:11,920 --> 00:51:14,040
between Wirecard and the Financial Times.
796
00:51:14,640 --> 00:51:17,520
[Martin in English]
Dan McCrum, for us, was the devil.
797
00:51:17,600 --> 00:51:21,440
He kept on bringing things out
that made the stock price go down.
798
00:51:22,560 --> 00:51:25,800
[reporter 2 in German] In February,
there were new articles and allegations
799
00:51:25,880 --> 00:51:27,640
and the share price fell again.
800
00:51:28,800 --> 00:51:31,800
At the end of March,
new accusations were published
801
00:51:31,880 --> 00:51:34,240
and the share price collapsed once again.
802
00:51:34,320 --> 00:51:37,680
A BILLIONAIRE ON THE DEFENSIVE
803
00:51:37,760 --> 00:51:40,840
[Martin in English] Senior management
at Wirecard very quickly said
804
00:51:40,920 --> 00:51:44,640
that the basis of this report
was completely without merit.
805
00:51:44,720 --> 00:51:47,000
[in German] There is a claim
that the Financial Times
806
00:51:47,080 --> 00:51:50,880
deliberately caused the fall
in the Wirecard share price
807
00:51:50,960 --> 00:51:53,200
so that speculators could cash in.
808
00:51:55,240 --> 00:51:58,160
[Martin in English] We thought
Dan McCrum was making a quick buck.
809
00:51:58,680 --> 00:52:01,400
They were the bad guys,
and we were the good guys.
810
00:52:02,000 --> 00:52:04,560
-[man in German] Sound running.
-Okay. Let's start.
811
00:52:05,200 --> 00:52:10,800
How do you personally go about scandals,
confusion, chaos?
812
00:52:10,880 --> 00:52:12,840
Have you ever thought about resigning?
813
00:52:12,920 --> 00:52:14,920
[chuckles] I've never thought
about resignation.
814
00:52:15,000 --> 00:52:17,760
Can you exclude the possibility
of more dirty laundry airing
815
00:52:17,840 --> 00:52:19,840
that will put the share price
under pressure?
816
00:52:19,920 --> 00:52:23,040
We firmly reject
these serious allegations.
817
00:52:23,120 --> 00:52:28,680
We think these allegations
are mainly market speculations.
818
00:52:30,200 --> 00:52:33,320
[Paul in English] At that point,
the FT had run a series
819
00:52:33,400 --> 00:52:36,600
of really quite damaging allegations,
820
00:52:36,680 --> 00:52:40,680
but Wirecard's share price just seemed
to go up and up and up.
821
00:52:40,760 --> 00:52:42,480
People loved the company.
822
00:52:42,560 --> 00:52:45,360
[reporter 3 in German]
At the Frankfurt stock exchange,
823
00:52:45,440 --> 00:52:49,600
Wirecard has announced its annual results,
increasing its profits by 35%,
824
00:52:49,680 --> 00:52:52,320
an increase of €350 million,
825
00:52:52,400 --> 00:52:54,960
and says it will continue
to grow this year.
826
00:52:55,040 --> 00:52:57,960
[reporter 4 in English] Following a move
from the payments giant Wirecard,
827
00:52:58,040 --> 00:52:59,720
shares jumping more than 6% there
828
00:52:59,800 --> 00:53:02,440
after the company landed
a one-billion-dollar investment
829
00:53:02,520 --> 00:53:04,760
from Japan's SoftBank group.
830
00:53:04,840 --> 00:53:09,720
SoftBank investing a billion dollars
in German FinTech company Wirecard.
831
00:53:09,800 --> 00:53:13,320
[Paul] When news
of the SoftBank investment emerged,
832
00:53:13,400 --> 00:53:14,320
we were dumbfounded.
833
00:53:14,400 --> 00:53:16,400
[reporter 5] In exchange for a 6% stake,
834
00:53:16,480 --> 00:53:20,000
SoftBank will help the firm expand
to Japan and South Korea.
835
00:53:20,080 --> 00:53:21,320
[Paul] We couldn't believe it.
836
00:53:21,400 --> 00:53:24,800
You know, we had put
what we thought was clear evidence
837
00:53:24,880 --> 00:53:27,120
that this was a fraud on the table.
838
00:53:27,720 --> 00:53:32,880
But SoftBank were about
to give this company 900 million euros.
839
00:53:36,760 --> 00:53:39,640
At that point with Dan,
I started discussing
840
00:53:39,720 --> 00:53:44,880
how we were going to actually present
evidence that was overwhelming.
841
00:53:47,480 --> 00:53:49,280
This is a criminal enterprise.
842
00:53:50,640 --> 00:53:54,880
So, Wirecard had to do something…
to stop us.
843
00:53:55,680 --> 00:53:58,840
[phone rings]
844
00:53:58,920 --> 00:54:01,480
[Dan] The next day,
I get a letter from Wirecard saying,
845
00:54:01,560 --> 00:54:05,120
"We've got this tape recording
of this guy called Nick Gold,
846
00:54:05,200 --> 00:54:07,640
and he knows that the FT story is coming,
847
00:54:07,720 --> 00:54:11,440
and you're clearly in cahoots,
and you're corrupt."
848
00:54:11,520 --> 00:54:13,520
[tense music plays]
849
00:54:15,160 --> 00:54:18,440
My first thought was,
"Okay. Uh, this has to be a setup."
850
00:54:19,840 --> 00:54:22,760
"This has got
to be Marsalek's dirty tricks again."
851
00:54:22,840 --> 00:54:26,560
[Nick talks]
852
00:54:37,840 --> 00:54:39,440
I had no idea who Nick Gold was.
853
00:54:40,400 --> 00:54:42,400
[mischievous music plays]
854
00:54:48,000 --> 00:54:49,000
[Nick] I am Nick Gold.
855
00:54:49,080 --> 00:54:50,680
Catch! That's it!
856
00:54:50,760 --> 00:54:51,760
I'm an investor.
857
00:54:52,280 --> 00:54:54,320
A bad investor, but an investor.
858
00:54:56,680 --> 00:54:59,160
[Paul] I first met Nick Gold by chance.
859
00:55:00,360 --> 00:55:05,880
Gary Kilbey was having drinks
to celebrate his 60th birthday,
860
00:55:05,960 --> 00:55:07,760
and Nick Gold was there.
861
00:55:07,840 --> 00:55:09,360
[men laugh]
862
00:55:09,440 --> 00:55:12,600
[Nick] I remember Paul Murphy.
We were both getting drunk together.
863
00:55:12,680 --> 00:55:16,480
He told me if I needed a journalist,
and I had a story to report, he was one.
864
00:55:16,560 --> 00:55:18,680
Drink as much as you can take, here!
865
00:55:18,760 --> 00:55:20,120
[men cheer]
866
00:55:20,200 --> 00:55:24,080
[Nick] And I phoned him months later,
and said, "Can I see you?"
867
00:55:24,160 --> 00:55:27,520
He says, "I can't do it for two weeks,
'cause I'm stuck on Wirecard."
868
00:55:27,600 --> 00:55:29,520
The minute he said,
"I'm stuck on Wirecard,"
869
00:55:29,600 --> 00:55:31,240
I knew this was a no-brainer scenario.
870
00:55:31,320 --> 00:55:33,480
He'll bring something out.
It can't be positive,
871
00:55:33,560 --> 00:55:35,040
therefore this is free money.
872
00:55:35,800 --> 00:55:38,120
I have to short-sell this company
within an inch of my life.
873
00:55:38,200 --> 00:55:41,480
Which I did to the tune
of hundreds and hundreds of millions.
874
00:55:44,800 --> 00:55:47,760
I've now taken a huge short position
in Wirecard,
875
00:55:47,840 --> 00:55:49,240
which is probably known to them.
876
00:55:49,320 --> 00:55:51,160
They're going to see
who the big shorts are.
877
00:55:51,680 --> 00:55:54,040
So they now know Nick Gold
is a massive short seller.
878
00:55:58,400 --> 00:56:00,680
I'm then on a beach in Cannes,
879
00:56:01,280 --> 00:56:03,760
dancing on tables
and being a lunatic as I am,
880
00:56:03,840 --> 00:56:05,280
and having a great time.
881
00:56:06,400 --> 00:56:08,800
And somebody comes up to me
that I haven't seen in years.
882
00:56:08,880 --> 00:56:09,800
He's a football agent.
883
00:56:09,880 --> 00:56:11,880
I've known him forever.
He worked for me years ago,
884
00:56:11,960 --> 00:56:14,840
and he says he's now gotten
the Kuwaiti National Investment Fund
885
00:56:14,920 --> 00:56:17,400
and they're his partners
and he's got billions of pounds,
886
00:56:17,480 --> 00:56:19,120
they'd like to invest in the stock market.
887
00:56:19,200 --> 00:56:20,600
So could I help?
888
00:56:20,680 --> 00:56:23,400
[siren wailing]
889
00:56:23,480 --> 00:56:28,000
A few days later, I fly back to London
to meet the Kuwaiti Investment Fund.
890
00:56:31,000 --> 00:56:33,480
Well, what happened is
a magnificent sheikh walked in
891
00:56:33,560 --> 00:56:36,480
and his spokesperson next to him
walked in with my football guy,
892
00:56:36,560 --> 00:56:38,000
and they sat down.
893
00:56:38,080 --> 00:56:40,840
'Cause I'm with my friend,
I thought I could speak openly.
894
00:56:40,920 --> 00:56:44,400
I then tell him there are billions
to be made short selling Wirecard.
895
00:56:44,920 --> 00:56:46,840
And I know the company's going down
896
00:56:46,920 --> 00:56:49,280
because the Financial Times
are writing an article,
897
00:56:49,360 --> 00:56:50,720
and the company is fraudulent,
898
00:56:51,360 --> 00:56:53,760
and that we were going
to build great big ships together.
899
00:56:53,840 --> 00:56:56,240
[tense music plays]
900
00:56:56,320 --> 00:56:59,200
This was as sheikh as you get.
He stank of affluence.
901
00:56:59,280 --> 00:57:02,320
The man stank of money.
You could tell this is a proper sheikh.
902
00:57:02,400 --> 00:57:03,760
As it turns out, I was wrong.
903
00:57:03,840 --> 00:57:06,280
[tense music intensifies]
904
00:57:06,360 --> 00:57:10,200
The sheikh left, and the guys stayed
to facilitate for the sheikh,
905
00:57:10,280 --> 00:57:11,920
and I was left with those two.
906
00:57:12,680 --> 00:57:14,800
-Hey. I'm Nick Gold.
-[man 1] Hello, Nick. How are you?
907
00:57:14,880 --> 00:57:17,960
[Nick] What sort of size business
were you thinking of doing?
908
00:57:18,040 --> 00:57:20,520
[man 1] At the moment,
they are looking at investing €50 million.
909
00:57:20,600 --> 00:57:21,440
[Nick] Okay.
910
00:57:22,200 --> 00:57:25,120
[man 2 in German]
There was a short seller, Nick Gold,
911
00:57:25,200 --> 00:57:30,840
who met with an investor
who secretly recorded him.
912
00:57:31,360 --> 00:57:33,880
[Nick in English]
This is as good as it gets in terms of--
913
00:57:33,960 --> 00:57:36,000
-We know the article's coming.
[man 1] Okay.
914
00:57:36,080 --> 00:57:37,640
[Nick] And I bet it's gonna be today.
915
00:57:38,120 --> 00:57:41,240
[in German] We know now that this investor
was actually a private detective
916
00:57:41,320 --> 00:57:46,720
who was hired
by someone associated with Wirecard.
917
00:57:48,080 --> 00:57:50,400
[man 1 talks in English]
918
00:57:50,480 --> 00:57:51,720
[Nick talks]
919
00:57:51,800 --> 00:57:52,800
[man 1 talks]
920
00:57:52,880 --> 00:57:57,000
[Nick talks]
921
00:57:57,520 --> 00:58:00,080
[man 1 talks]
922
00:58:00,160 --> 00:58:01,640
[Nick talks]
923
00:58:01,720 --> 00:58:02,800
[man 1 talks]
924
00:58:06,440 --> 00:58:09,600
So what Wirecard did was--
The sheikh wasn't real. It was fake.
925
00:58:10,400 --> 00:58:12,800
The friend of mine,
that paid the guy four million,
926
00:58:12,880 --> 00:58:15,680
he got my four million by the way,
that bastard.
927
00:58:15,760 --> 00:58:18,760
Then I got a text message
from Paul Murphy saying,
928
00:58:18,840 --> 00:58:20,440
"What the fuck have you done?"
929
00:58:21,520 --> 00:58:23,560
[Paul] This was a complete setup.
930
00:58:24,680 --> 00:58:26,640
Oh, I was furious, absolutely furious
931
00:58:26,720 --> 00:58:31,360
because Wirecard's found a way
of presenting evidence
932
00:58:31,440 --> 00:58:35,440
that appeared to show
that I personally was in cahoots
933
00:58:35,520 --> 00:58:38,920
with a guy
who was making money shorting the stock.
934
00:58:43,080 --> 00:58:47,840
[Paul] Within hours, all this detail
is in the hands of the German press,
935
00:58:47,920 --> 00:58:49,880
who are writing articles saying,
936
00:58:49,960 --> 00:58:53,240
"Here's clear evidence
that the FT's corrupt."
937
00:58:55,640 --> 00:58:58,920
[Lionel] I was pretty pissed off,
actually. Pretty pissed off.
938
00:58:59,000 --> 00:59:01,720
I was confident that we'd been set up,
939
00:59:01,800 --> 00:59:05,520
but I have to protect
the reputation of the FT.
940
00:59:05,600 --> 00:59:09,120
You know, I thought,
"Paul you're a brilliant reporter,
941
00:59:09,200 --> 00:59:11,320
but you've done something really dumb."
942
00:59:11,400 --> 00:59:13,840
"You're gonna have
to spend time in the sin bin."
943
00:59:15,000 --> 00:59:19,280
And that meant
a rigorous external legal investigation
944
00:59:19,360 --> 00:59:22,560
to show the world
that there was no truth in that.
945
00:59:24,160 --> 00:59:27,080
[Dan] That was the first time
that I really felt vulnerable.
946
00:59:27,600 --> 00:59:29,280
You know, we were basically suspended.
947
00:59:30,240 --> 00:59:33,440
So we have to sit and wait
for this investigation to happen.
948
00:59:34,360 --> 00:59:36,880
But then the story gets weirder
and weirder.
949
00:59:36,960 --> 00:59:39,880
[tense music plays]
950
00:59:44,560 --> 00:59:46,920
[in German] I'm Jorg Schmitt
from the Süddeutsche Zeitung.
951
00:59:47,840 --> 00:59:50,840
I'm the chief editor
of the investigations team.
952
00:59:51,360 --> 00:59:56,240
I was at my desk when I suddenly
got a call from an unknown number.
953
00:59:57,160 --> 00:59:59,720
On the other end was a young woman.
954
00:59:59,800 --> 01:00:01,920
She said,
"Are you interested in Wirecard?"
955
01:00:03,160 --> 01:00:05,600
"Do you know Prinzregentenstrasse 61?"
956
01:00:05,680 --> 01:00:08,960
"It's the secret office of Jan Marsalek."
957
01:00:09,800 --> 01:00:12,960
Even colleagues closest
to Marsalek didn't know
958
01:00:13,040 --> 01:00:16,240
that there was this second office
in the Prinzregentenstrasse.
959
01:00:17,000 --> 01:00:21,840
He would meet
with a very illustrious circle of people,
960
01:00:21,920 --> 01:00:25,680
do business, and host wild parties.
961
01:00:25,760 --> 01:00:27,480
[tense music continues]
962
01:00:27,560 --> 01:00:31,480
It's Marsalek's boy gang, I'd say.
963
01:00:31,560 --> 01:00:33,040
We always find Martin W.,
964
01:00:33,120 --> 01:00:36,360
who had been
in the Austrian secret service.
965
01:00:36,440 --> 01:00:41,320
El-Obeidi,
a former Libyan intelligence officer.
966
01:00:41,840 --> 01:00:48,760
Stani, a Russian who was supposedly
in Munich visiting his sick mother,
967
01:00:48,840 --> 01:00:55,040
but we think he was probably an FSB man,
a Russian secret-service agent.
968
01:00:56,040 --> 01:01:02,720
So suddenly
we had three former intelligence agents
969
01:01:02,800 --> 01:01:07,400
who were in and around
the Prinzregentenstrasse.
970
01:01:07,480 --> 01:01:11,640
And the thing is the Prinzregentenstrasse
is not just anywhere in Munich.
971
01:01:11,720 --> 01:01:14,920
It is directly opposite
the Russian consulate.
972
01:01:16,680 --> 01:01:19,400
There is obviously
a secret-service connection.
973
01:01:20,520 --> 01:01:22,080
That electrified me.
974
01:01:23,560 --> 01:01:28,600
Why might Marsalek be so interesting
to intelligence agencies?
975
01:01:31,160 --> 01:01:32,960
Wirecard is a company
976
01:01:33,040 --> 01:01:35,880
through which there are billions
of transactions every year.
977
01:01:36,520 --> 01:01:40,120
And these payments are gold mines
for the secret services
978
01:01:40,200 --> 01:01:43,600
because they show who could be compromised
979
01:01:43,680 --> 01:01:47,880
because their creditcard information
could show porn usage,
980
01:01:47,960 --> 01:01:49,920
brothel visits, or whatever else.
981
01:01:52,320 --> 01:01:54,080
To have a source like Marsalek
982
01:01:54,160 --> 01:01:56,640
who is always
on the move around the world,
983
01:01:56,720 --> 01:01:58,560
that makes a lot of sense.
984
01:01:58,640 --> 01:01:59,800
[tense music ends]
985
01:02:02,320 --> 01:02:04,840
[mischievous music plays]
986
01:02:10,000 --> 01:02:11,480
[cars honking]
987
01:02:19,560 --> 01:02:21,560
[man in English]
When the news came through
988
01:02:21,640 --> 01:02:23,760
that Paul had been suspended,
989
01:02:23,840 --> 01:02:25,920
Paul pulled me aside and basically said,
990
01:02:26,000 --> 01:02:28,640
"Both Braun and Marsalek are Austrian."
991
01:02:28,720 --> 01:02:32,320
"Ask around.
See what you can find in Vienna."
992
01:02:34,560 --> 01:02:36,960
Someone recommended this politician
993
01:02:37,040 --> 01:02:40,440
that was looking
at all kinds of political-corruption stuff
994
01:02:40,520 --> 01:02:41,720
going on in Austria.
995
01:02:42,360 --> 01:02:43,720
Stephanie Krisper.
996
01:02:46,240 --> 01:02:50,040
[in German] Vienna is sadly mostly
an inviting terrain
997
01:02:50,120 --> 01:02:52,200
for intelligence officers,
998
01:02:52,280 --> 01:02:57,000
for dubious characters,
spies, economic spies.
999
01:03:00,480 --> 01:03:03,000
[Sam in English]
We met on a boat in the Danube Canal.
1000
01:03:03,080 --> 01:03:05,880
I just sort of said,
"Do you know Jan Marsalek?"
1001
01:03:07,520 --> 01:03:09,880
She sat back a bit and pondered.
1002
01:03:11,320 --> 01:03:13,560
She knew someone that knows Jan,
1003
01:03:14,280 --> 01:03:16,080
but she had to be very careful
1004
01:03:16,160 --> 01:03:19,880
because he was fearful
of who Jan was involved with.
1005
01:03:19,960 --> 01:03:22,720
[indistinct chatter]
1006
01:03:22,800 --> 01:03:25,800
And so we arranged
to meet him at Café Pruckel.
1007
01:03:28,320 --> 01:03:31,960
Stephanie walked in
and introduced me to this friend of hers.
1008
01:03:32,720 --> 01:03:36,080
What followed were probably
the most remarkable 20 minutes
1009
01:03:36,160 --> 01:03:39,520
in my short 14 years in journalism.
1010
01:03:39,600 --> 01:03:42,360
[tense music plays]
1011
01:03:43,480 --> 01:03:46,800
My name is Killian Kleinschmidt.
I'm a German National.
1012
01:03:46,880 --> 01:03:52,200
I've been working with the United Nations
on issues of migration and refugees.
1013
01:03:52,920 --> 01:03:54,680
I mean, that's something I know.
1014
01:03:54,760 --> 01:03:57,200
Um, how to deal
with large numbers of people on the move.
1015
01:03:59,560 --> 01:04:03,040
2016, Austria is building up
to the elections.
1016
01:04:03,120 --> 01:04:05,280
Um, I received an email
1017
01:04:05,360 --> 01:04:07,480
asking me whether I would be interested
1018
01:04:07,560 --> 01:04:10,240
to work on a project with Jan Marsalek.
1019
01:04:11,360 --> 01:04:13,240
I didn't know who that was.
1020
01:04:13,320 --> 01:04:15,680
I did not even know Wirecard. [chuckles]
1021
01:04:17,720 --> 01:04:21,080
A few days later,
we met in the famous restaurant,
1022
01:04:21,160 --> 01:04:22,440
the Kafer in Munich.
1023
01:04:23,600 --> 01:04:25,720
Extremely eloquent, smiling,
1024
01:04:25,800 --> 01:04:29,280
the Austrian smart-ass,
very smooth talker.
1025
01:04:29,360 --> 01:04:33,520
He stressed that he was very interested
to do a project in Libya.
1026
01:04:33,600 --> 01:04:35,680
[tense music intensifies]
1027
01:04:35,760 --> 01:04:38,680
[reporter] Crossing the Sahara
in search of a better life,
1028
01:04:38,760 --> 01:04:41,040
these migrants are bound for Europe.
1029
01:04:42,160 --> 01:04:44,640
And this is where their long ride begins,
1030
01:04:44,720 --> 01:04:47,280
several days' drive
from the Libyan border.
1031
01:04:51,640 --> 01:04:55,920
He stressed this knowledge of Libya,
where he said he had been several times,
1032
01:04:56,000 --> 01:04:57,600
but that his real interest
1033
01:04:57,680 --> 01:05:01,440
was really to contribute
to the stabilization of Libya.
1034
01:05:03,280 --> 01:05:05,640
He presented himself as doing good work.
1035
01:05:06,400 --> 01:05:10,960
So we agreed that he would put in
200,000 euros to finance my team,
1036
01:05:11,040 --> 01:05:13,480
working with refugee camps in Libya.
1037
01:05:13,560 --> 01:05:14,640
[glasses clinking]
1038
01:05:15,720 --> 01:05:17,080
It was fantastic. We liked it.
1039
01:05:17,160 --> 01:05:19,280
[tense music continues]
1040
01:05:19,360 --> 01:05:22,000
The relationship with Marsalek
was managed by two persons.
1041
01:05:23,080 --> 01:05:27,120
Wolfgang Gattringer, who used to work
in the Austrian Ministry of Interior,
1042
01:05:27,720 --> 01:05:32,280
and Brigadier Gustenau
from the Ministry of Defense of Austria.
1043
01:05:33,360 --> 01:05:36,040
Then popped up Colonel Andrey Chuprygin,
1044
01:05:36,120 --> 01:05:39,040
the former secret-service officer
from Russia.
1045
01:05:39,800 --> 01:05:43,760
He is presented not only as the guy
who works with Jan,
1046
01:05:43,840 --> 01:05:46,360
but also the guy
who coordinates Russian interests
1047
01:05:46,440 --> 01:05:48,560
in the Middle East and North Africa.
1048
01:05:49,760 --> 01:05:51,880
There should have been alarm bells.
1049
01:05:54,200 --> 01:05:57,800
In mid-February, we meet Marsalek
in the Prinzregentenstrasse,
1050
01:05:57,880 --> 01:06:01,120
just opposite
the Russian General Consulate in Munich.
1051
01:06:02,840 --> 01:06:05,880
It's an empty place. It's an old building.
1052
01:06:08,560 --> 01:06:09,920
Nice pieces of art.
1053
01:06:21,080 --> 01:06:26,520
There is Marsalek talking to Gattringer
and Gustenau and he said,
1054
01:06:26,600 --> 01:06:30,800
"I want to train and equip
a border-guard force
1055
01:06:30,880 --> 01:06:34,240
of 15, maybe 20,000 men in Libya."
1056
01:06:36,440 --> 01:06:40,200
Basically preventing people in distress
from crossing the border.
1057
01:06:41,520 --> 01:06:43,280
This is all very bad.
1058
01:06:45,360 --> 01:06:48,280
[Stephanie in German]
Border security in Libya was a topic that,
1059
01:06:48,360 --> 01:06:53,440
for a COO of a company like Wirecard,
wasn't normal in the slightest.
1060
01:06:54,560 --> 01:06:58,240
As time went on, I asked myself,
"What does he want in Libya?"
1061
01:06:58,320 --> 01:07:01,560
"And why does he seem
to be getting support
1062
01:07:01,640 --> 01:07:04,040
from within the Austrian government
1063
01:07:04,120 --> 01:07:07,560
for a project
that doesn't have humanitarian aims?"
1064
01:07:08,800 --> 01:07:11,240
[Killian in English]
For me, then that all clicked.
1065
01:07:11,320 --> 01:07:15,800
Migration is the theme which makes you win
or lose elections in Europe.
1066
01:07:16,400 --> 01:07:19,840
[in German] If you ignore negative trends
1067
01:07:19,920 --> 01:07:23,160
or if you let immigration go unchecked,
1068
01:07:23,240 --> 01:07:25,680
things will go downhill very quickly.
1069
01:07:25,760 --> 01:07:29,240
[Killian in English]
Jan Marsalek was acting as the in-between
1070
01:07:29,320 --> 01:07:31,920
for the Russians
and for the right-wing populist parties.
1071
01:07:34,800 --> 01:07:37,480
[Stephanie in German]
It is logical that if Russia
1072
01:07:37,560 --> 01:07:39,960
wants to destabilize Europe,
1073
01:07:41,040 --> 01:07:45,840
they would try to create anxiety
over supposed waves of refugees
1074
01:07:45,920 --> 01:07:49,720
to create a narrative
that heats the debate again.
1075
01:07:50,920 --> 01:07:53,720
Marsalek has very good contacts in Russia.
1076
01:07:55,280 --> 01:07:59,120
That's why it's plausible
that Jan Marsalek could have been trying
1077
01:07:59,200 --> 01:08:01,400
to set something up for the Russians.
1078
01:08:04,560 --> 01:08:06,520
[steps approaching]
1079
01:08:06,600 --> 01:08:09,240
[Sam in English] My mind was going
at a million miles an hour.
1080
01:08:09,320 --> 01:08:10,920
It was clearly bonkers.
1081
01:08:11,000 --> 01:08:15,600
The COO of a German company
is not supposed to be involved
1082
01:08:15,680 --> 01:08:18,520
in encouraging
disruptive right-wing parties
1083
01:08:18,600 --> 01:08:23,560
to capitalize on migration problems,
or recruiting militiamen.
1084
01:08:25,120 --> 01:08:27,240
The idea would be crazy
1085
01:08:27,320 --> 01:08:30,680
were it not for the fact
that I just felt it rang true.
1086
01:08:42,160 --> 01:08:45,120
[somber music plays]
1087
01:08:49,040 --> 01:08:51,320
[camera shutter clicking]
1088
01:08:51,400 --> 01:08:56,200
[Dan] So Sam starts finding
about all these insane Russian links.
1089
01:08:57,160 --> 01:08:59,320
[camera zooming in]
1090
01:09:01,400 --> 01:09:02,840
[camera shutter clicking]
1091
01:09:04,200 --> 01:09:08,120
Now, we have to be, like,
state-security-level paranoid.
1092
01:09:09,120 --> 01:09:11,200
We're not even putting anything
in digital.
1093
01:09:11,280 --> 01:09:14,440
It all has to be handwritten,
and don't talk on the phone.
1094
01:09:14,520 --> 01:09:15,840
[camera shutter clicking]
1095
01:09:16,440 --> 01:09:20,160
Paul heard about 28 private detectives
1096
01:09:20,240 --> 01:09:22,600
who were wandering around London,
following people.
1097
01:09:23,400 --> 01:09:24,520
[Paul] I went after
1098
01:09:24,600 --> 01:09:27,840
the private investigators'
spying operation.
1099
01:09:27,920 --> 01:09:33,120
That led us to discovering
that the person bankrolling this operation
1100
01:09:33,200 --> 01:09:38,880
was a former Head of Foreign Intelligence
for the Libyan transitionary government.
1101
01:09:39,880 --> 01:09:41,520
Rami el-Obeidi.
1102
01:09:43,480 --> 01:09:50,440
We did know that Marsalek had interests
in Libya by that point.
1103
01:09:53,200 --> 01:09:57,480
[Dan] Whoever hears the words,
"Libyan spy chief," and thinks,
1104
01:09:57,560 --> 01:09:59,720
"Oh, right. Yeah. That's totally fine"?
1105
01:10:01,920 --> 01:10:06,240
And so I'm sort of leaving the house
looking for cameras,
1106
01:10:06,760 --> 01:10:09,920
leave the office at different times,
catch different trains.
1107
01:10:10,000 --> 01:10:12,400
[tense music plays]
1108
01:10:12,480 --> 01:10:13,600
I'd be on the Tube,
1109
01:10:15,200 --> 01:10:18,760
you'd reach your stop and then you wait
until just before the doors close.
1110
01:10:18,840 --> 01:10:21,160
Then I'd jump out and sort of like,
1111
01:10:21,240 --> 01:10:24,160
"Did anyone else get off with me as well?"
1112
01:10:25,920 --> 01:10:27,720
[tense music intensifies]
1113
01:10:28,680 --> 01:10:30,480
[camera shutter clicking]
1114
01:10:32,600 --> 01:10:34,240
[camera shutter clicking]
1115
01:10:38,760 --> 01:10:42,520
That was the moment
when I felt nervous about my family.
1116
01:10:44,000 --> 01:10:47,920
This is Freddy McCrum, age three days.
1117
01:10:49,440 --> 01:10:50,720
That's what you worry about.
1118
01:10:50,800 --> 01:10:53,120
Because you'd do anything
to protect your children.
1119
01:10:53,720 --> 01:10:57,920
And the idea that you would put them
in danger for some story…
1120
01:10:59,000 --> 01:11:00,840
I mean, who wants to do that?
1121
01:11:03,120 --> 01:11:03,960
Um…
1122
01:11:05,880 --> 01:11:08,360
[Florian in German]
It's criminal to wiretap journalists.
1123
01:11:08,440 --> 01:11:11,240
It's criminal
to hack their email accounts.
1124
01:11:11,920 --> 01:11:18,440
The worst part was that this intimidation
was quite successful.
1125
01:11:19,280 --> 01:11:23,520
The Financial Times had launched
an internal inquiry into Dan McCrum,
1126
01:11:23,600 --> 01:11:26,760
and Wirecard made the most of this time,
1127
01:11:26,840 --> 01:11:29,360
and its market price kept rising.
1128
01:11:29,440 --> 01:11:36,040
They even got the German Chancellor
to promote the company in China.
1129
01:11:36,120 --> 01:11:39,520
All this happened in those months
when the Financial Times
1130
01:11:39,600 --> 01:11:42,080
didn't write anything critical
of Wirecard.
1131
01:11:43,760 --> 01:11:45,680
[Lionel in English]
I went through a torrid time.
1132
01:11:45,760 --> 01:11:47,240
I wanted to get back at them.
1133
01:11:48,200 --> 01:11:49,360
I was livid.
1134
01:11:50,600 --> 01:11:54,240
Soon as the investigation was over,
when we get a clean bill of health,
1135
01:11:54,320 --> 01:11:56,000
I called in Paul and Dan.
1136
01:11:56,520 --> 01:11:59,520
I said, "The next story,
I want you to draw blood."
1137
01:11:59,600 --> 01:12:02,280
[tense music intensifies]
1138
01:12:05,840 --> 01:12:10,400
[Dan] We had to find a way
to make it absolutely clear to everybody
1139
01:12:10,480 --> 01:12:12,120
that Wirecard was a fake.
1140
01:12:14,800 --> 01:12:17,400
We were angry,
and there was no hanging back.
1141
01:12:17,480 --> 01:12:19,960
[paper printing]
1142
01:12:21,560 --> 01:12:23,000
It was the whole enchilada.
1143
01:12:23,880 --> 01:12:26,440
Wirecard is a fake,
its business isn't real,
1144
01:12:26,520 --> 01:12:28,520
and Markus Braun is lying to you.
1145
01:12:29,040 --> 01:12:31,000
And here are the documents that prove it.
1146
01:12:31,080 --> 01:12:34,640
[uptempo suspenseful music plays]
1147
01:12:36,880 --> 01:12:39,920
This is how it is doing the fakery.
1148
01:12:40,440 --> 01:12:44,000
Here are the partners that don't exist.
Here are the customers who don't exist.
1149
01:12:46,400 --> 01:12:50,240
Here is everything you need
to switch on the blue lights,
1150
01:12:50,320 --> 01:12:53,080
go down to Wirecard HQ,
and arrest everyone.
1151
01:12:55,040 --> 01:12:56,960
[reporter] The Financial Times suggest
1152
01:12:57,040 --> 01:12:59,520
that you've routed billions of euros
in payments
1153
01:12:59,600 --> 01:13:01,320
-to 34 names…
-Mm-hmm.
1154
01:13:01,400 --> 01:13:05,600
…through a partner company
in Dubai at Al Alam Solutions.
1155
01:13:05,680 --> 01:13:07,400
According to the FT,
1156
01:13:07,480 --> 01:13:11,080
more than half of the clients
have never heard of Al Alam.
1157
01:13:11,160 --> 01:13:13,120
[Markus] Let me give you
a clear statement here.
1158
01:13:13,200 --> 01:13:15,800
This information is not authentic,
1159
01:13:15,880 --> 01:13:18,160
how it was presented by the FT.
1160
01:13:18,240 --> 01:13:21,120
We can completely reject
these allegations.
1161
01:13:22,560 --> 01:13:24,720
[uptempo suspenseful music stops]
1162
01:13:24,800 --> 01:13:27,480
[Martin] Dan McCrum's reporting
at the Financial Times,
1163
01:13:27,560 --> 01:13:29,840
of course, made us uneasy.
1164
01:13:29,920 --> 01:13:34,360
However, I just didn't have any visibility
of any transactions
1165
01:13:34,440 --> 01:13:36,880
in the Middle East or the Philippines.
1166
01:13:36,960 --> 01:13:40,560
It didn't really make sense to me
that they couldn't exist.
1167
01:13:41,960 --> 01:13:45,120
It was painful
because this is something you believed in.
1168
01:13:49,760 --> 01:13:53,480
We believed
that we had put a hole in Wirecard
1169
01:13:53,560 --> 01:13:55,320
that would bring the business down,
1170
01:13:55,400 --> 01:13:57,560
but it didn't come crashing down.
1171
01:13:58,320 --> 01:14:03,480
But this latest evidence
from the FT was difficult to ignore.
1172
01:14:03,560 --> 01:14:08,440
Now Wirecard has categorically rejected
the allegations of impropriety.
1173
01:14:08,520 --> 01:14:10,160
But on October 21st,
1174
01:14:10,240 --> 01:14:13,480
Wirecard appointed KPMG
to conduct a special audit,
1175
01:14:13,560 --> 01:14:19,240
just to confirm that they have not engaged
in any improper accounting practices.
1176
01:14:20,920 --> 01:14:24,200
[in German]
Dr. Markus Braun, you've decided
1177
01:14:24,280 --> 01:14:27,000
to carry out an external audit
1178
01:14:27,080 --> 01:14:32,200
due to the allegations
that the FT have made.
1179
01:14:32,280 --> 01:14:34,760
The question is, "Why only now?"
1180
01:14:35,640 --> 01:14:37,200
Well, we reacted very quickly.
1181
01:14:37,280 --> 01:14:41,120
The newspaper article was published
only over a week ago.
1182
01:14:42,560 --> 01:14:46,400
At first, Braun didn't want this inquiry.
1183
01:14:46,480 --> 01:14:50,680
We reject these allegations 100%.
1184
01:14:51,280 --> 01:14:55,480
People at Wirecard must have known
that this is going to be troublesome.
1185
01:14:55,560 --> 01:14:58,160
When will the auditors present
their report?
1186
01:14:58,800 --> 01:15:03,320
I don't want to jump the gun,
but we think within a few months.
1187
01:15:03,400 --> 01:15:07,680
We believe
we will have results very quickly.
1188
01:15:09,640 --> 01:15:11,680
[Dan in English]
Holy shit. The story's working.
1189
01:15:12,200 --> 01:15:15,720
Finally, you know, we had an impact.
They haven't been able to brush it off.
1190
01:15:15,800 --> 01:15:18,040
There's been enough pressure
from their investors
1191
01:15:18,120 --> 01:15:21,000
that they've had
to appoint KPMG. [inhales]
1192
01:15:21,080 --> 01:15:23,480
It felt like the stakes were high
at that point.
1193
01:15:23,560 --> 01:15:25,560
[tense music plays]
1194
01:15:32,640 --> 01:15:34,480
[in German] My name is Joachim Giehl.
1195
01:15:35,280 --> 01:15:37,760
I am Markus Braun's neighbor.
1196
01:15:40,360 --> 01:15:42,640
I always had the impression
1197
01:15:42,720 --> 01:15:45,320
that this man is under
a massive amount of pressure.
1198
01:15:48,520 --> 01:15:51,560
He greeted nobody as his neighbor.
1199
01:15:51,640 --> 01:15:53,800
He always just got in his car.
1200
01:15:53,880 --> 01:15:55,840
No hello, no nothing.
1201
01:16:00,760 --> 01:16:05,960
There was one day, around 8:30 p.m.,
1202
01:16:06,040 --> 01:16:09,000
I parked my car in the garage.
1203
01:16:09,600 --> 01:16:15,200
It was dark, and I saw Markus Braun
at the entrance to our building.
1204
01:16:17,040 --> 01:16:21,920
I saw him in the lamplight,
and he looked extremely tense.
1205
01:16:23,920 --> 01:16:28,960
He was surrounded by some men
whom I didn't recognize.
1206
01:16:31,760 --> 01:16:33,240
They seemed out of place.
1207
01:16:35,200 --> 01:16:37,600
They didn't look like businesspeople.
1208
01:16:37,680 --> 01:16:43,000
They looked like people
who work as security, bodyguards,
1209
01:16:43,080 --> 01:16:45,280
a group of thugs… [exhales]
1210
01:16:45,360 --> 01:16:47,120
…or people like that.
1211
01:16:48,680 --> 01:16:52,240
They didn't look
like they were there to protect him.
1212
01:16:52,320 --> 01:16:56,560
Rather, I thought they were there…
1213
01:16:56,640 --> 01:16:58,120
[exhales]
1214
01:16:58,200 --> 01:16:59,360
…to do a job.
1215
01:16:59,440 --> 01:17:02,360
[dog barking]
1216
01:17:06,800 --> 01:17:09,920
[in English] Dr. Markus Braun
and Jan Marsalek's relationship
1217
01:17:10,000 --> 01:17:11,800
definitely deteriorated.
1218
01:17:13,760 --> 01:17:16,120
In December 2019,
1219
01:17:16,200 --> 01:17:19,080
we had a Christmas party for our team,
1220
01:17:19,960 --> 01:17:23,200
and Jan Marsalek arrived
somewhat unexpectedly.
1221
01:17:24,520 --> 01:17:27,400
And then he said… in a smiling fashion,
1222
01:17:27,480 --> 01:17:31,880
"Martin, if you stole 100,000
from the company,
1223
01:17:31,960 --> 01:17:34,120
I would not have respect for you."
1224
01:17:34,200 --> 01:17:36,240
"If you're gonna steal it
from the company,
1225
01:17:36,320 --> 01:17:37,960
you have to steal millions,
1226
01:17:38,040 --> 01:17:39,600
hundreds of millions."
1227
01:17:40,480 --> 01:17:43,400
[suspenseful music plays]
1228
01:17:43,480 --> 01:17:45,560
[Paul] While this was happening,
1229
01:17:45,640 --> 01:17:48,560
Braun comes up with this fantastic idea.
1230
01:17:50,280 --> 01:17:51,640
His biggest yet.
1231
01:17:52,600 --> 01:17:55,640
The plan was to take over Deutsche Bank,
1232
01:17:55,720 --> 01:17:57,520
Germany's biggest bank.
1233
01:17:59,240 --> 01:18:01,640
[Felix in German]
It was called "Project Panther,"
1234
01:18:01,720 --> 01:18:04,360
a plan for a hostile takeover.
1235
01:18:04,960 --> 01:18:09,440
A large consulting company
put a document together
1236
01:18:09,520 --> 01:18:12,920
which showed how it could make sense
1237
01:18:13,000 --> 01:18:15,480
to merge an old bank
with a new tech company.
1238
01:18:17,080 --> 01:18:20,760
The "Wirebank,"
or whatever it would have been called.
1239
01:18:22,320 --> 01:18:24,760
The idea was
1240
01:18:24,840 --> 01:18:27,760
if you merged these two companies,
1241
01:18:27,840 --> 01:18:31,920
with the Deutsche Bank balance
being so much bigger than Wirecard's,
1242
01:18:32,000 --> 01:18:36,440
that then maybe the fraud at Wirecard
would somehow get swept under the rug.
1243
01:18:38,120 --> 01:18:40,600
[Paul in English]
If you've got a bank like Deutsche Bank,
1244
01:18:40,680 --> 01:18:44,040
you can hide a lot of bad numbers
inside a bank that big.
1245
01:18:45,400 --> 01:18:47,080
[Dan] It's sort of genius, really.
1246
01:18:47,760 --> 01:18:49,880
It's a bit like instead of having
a getaway car,
1247
01:18:49,960 --> 01:18:52,000
it's just gone into the bank
and taken over.
1248
01:18:53,880 --> 01:18:55,280
And if they'd done that, you know,
1249
01:18:55,360 --> 01:18:58,080
Markus Braun would have been
the genius financier,
1250
01:18:58,160 --> 01:19:01,640
who was now running one of the
world's largest financial institutions.
1251
01:19:04,080 --> 01:19:07,920
[Paul] It was essentially
Braun's last roll of the dice.
1252
01:19:09,040 --> 01:19:11,160
[suspenseful music intensifies]
1253
01:19:11,240 --> 01:19:14,320
Wirecard's existing auditors, EY,
1254
01:19:14,400 --> 01:19:19,480
were taking extra steps
to check that 1.9 billion of cash,
1255
01:19:19,560 --> 01:19:23,560
which Wirecard claimed, actually existed.
1256
01:19:24,280 --> 01:19:26,120
[Stefania] Wirecard essentially said
1257
01:19:26,200 --> 01:19:31,720
that 1.9 billion euros was sitting
in two Philippine banks.
1258
01:19:32,320 --> 01:19:35,400
[Paul] On this occasion,
the auditors wanted real proof
1259
01:19:35,480 --> 01:19:39,800
that Wirecard had access
to the money it claimed,
1260
01:19:39,880 --> 01:19:43,800
which, of course, Wirecard couldn't do
because the money didn't exist.
1261
01:19:44,400 --> 01:19:49,280
So everybody wanted to know,
would EY find out the truth?
1262
01:19:55,400 --> 01:19:56,880
[sirens wailing]
1263
01:19:56,960 --> 01:19:59,360
-[tense music plays]
-[cars honking]
1264
01:19:59,440 --> 01:20:01,280
-[tires squealing]
-[sirens wailing]
1265
01:20:07,040 --> 01:20:09,560
[Fahmi] That night, I couldn't sleep…
1266
01:20:10,720 --> 01:20:12,640
because I wanted to be prepared.
1267
01:20:14,920 --> 01:20:18,360
Whatever I could get my hands on,
as far as shares of Wirecard,
1268
01:20:18,440 --> 01:20:22,560
I got it because, you know, in my gut,
I knew it was going to happen that day.
1269
01:20:24,520 --> 01:20:28,440
We got close to 100 million
at the, you know, peak of Wirecard
1270
01:20:29,840 --> 01:20:31,520
until I ran out of shares to short.
1271
01:20:39,600 --> 01:20:40,760
[Dan] That morning,
1272
01:20:40,840 --> 01:20:44,320
I'm up at six o'clock
waiting for something to happen.
1273
01:20:45,360 --> 01:20:47,280
Suddenly this announcement pops up.
1274
01:20:47,960 --> 01:20:52,960
[in German] Auditors can
no longer locate €1.9 billion
1275
01:20:53,040 --> 01:20:55,680
that are said to be
in escrow accounts in Asia.
1276
01:20:55,760 --> 01:20:57,920
[reporter] The two banks
in the Philippines
1277
01:20:58,000 --> 01:21:00,440
where the €1.9 billion was supposed to be
1278
01:21:00,520 --> 01:21:02,920
said today
that they had no business relations
1279
01:21:03,000 --> 01:21:04,680
with the payments processor.
1280
01:21:04,760 --> 01:21:06,240
The documents were faked.
1281
01:21:07,600 --> 01:21:12,400
[in English] As soon as I saw that,
I just knew it's completely game over.
1282
01:21:12,480 --> 01:21:14,480
[tense music intensifies]
1283
01:21:16,560 --> 01:21:19,800
The share price crashes.
The short sellers can all see it.
1284
01:21:19,880 --> 01:21:22,720
They start selling
every single Wirecard share
1285
01:21:22,800 --> 01:21:25,520
they can get their hands on
and finally make a fortune from it.
1286
01:21:25,600 --> 01:21:28,800
How do you simply miss
a couple of billion dollars?
1287
01:21:29,400 --> 01:21:34,160
[in German]
The share price plunged by 70%.
1288
01:21:34,240 --> 01:21:35,720
[in English] Fucking hell. We did it!
1289
01:21:35,800 --> 01:21:37,360
You know… [laughs]
1290
01:21:37,440 --> 01:21:38,600
…I mean, we did it.
1291
01:21:38,680 --> 01:21:40,680
We finally got those bastards.
1292
01:21:45,400 --> 01:21:47,440
[tense music ends]
1293
01:21:47,520 --> 01:21:49,560
[Fahmi] When you make money,
obviously it's great.
1294
01:21:49,640 --> 01:21:52,560
You know, we're happy for our investors
and it's a huge win.
1295
01:21:53,240 --> 01:21:56,160
Our satisfaction,
the excitement is in the hunt,
1296
01:21:56,240 --> 01:21:58,400
but Wirecard was our biggest winner,
1297
01:21:58,480 --> 01:22:03,280
and I suspect it'll be our biggest winner,
um, for a long while.
1298
01:22:05,360 --> 01:22:07,520
[Markus in German] Ladies and gentlemen,
1299
01:22:07,600 --> 01:22:10,720
on behalf
of the management board of Wirecard,
1300
01:22:10,800 --> 01:22:12,920
I would like to give
the following explanation.
1301
01:22:13,000 --> 01:22:15,960
[Jorg] The press conference that night
was like The Muppet Show.
1302
01:22:17,400 --> 01:22:19,480
Braun reads from the teleprompter.
1303
01:22:20,920 --> 01:22:23,040
The death sentence
has already been handed out,
1304
01:22:23,120 --> 01:22:27,680
and he's still making it seem
as if he's going to announce
1305
01:22:27,760 --> 01:22:30,760
an amazing quarterly report next month.
1306
01:22:31,360 --> 01:22:36,120
Right now,
it cannot be ruled out that Wirecard
1307
01:22:36,200 --> 01:22:39,520
has become the damaged party
1308
01:22:39,600 --> 01:22:43,040
in a fraud case
of considerable proportions.
1309
01:22:44,640 --> 01:22:45,960
[Dan in English] Within a week,
1310
01:22:46,040 --> 01:22:49,120
Wirecard has been placed
into administration. It's gone bust.
1311
01:22:49,200 --> 01:22:51,400
[reporter 1] Former CEO of Wirecard
has been arrested
1312
01:22:51,480 --> 01:22:53,760
on suspicion of falsifying accounts.
1313
01:22:53,840 --> 01:22:56,000
And Markus Braun has been arrested.
1314
01:22:57,000 --> 01:22:59,760
But Jan Marsalek just disappears.
1315
01:23:01,680 --> 01:23:05,800
[in German] Where is the COO
of the insolvent payment processor,
1316
01:23:05,880 --> 01:23:08,760
Wirecard, the Austrian, Jan Marsalek?
1317
01:23:10,840 --> 01:23:14,080
[reporter 2 in English] Wirecard's former
Chief Operating Officer, Jan Marsalek
1318
01:23:14,160 --> 01:23:16,360
may have returned to the Philippines.
1319
01:23:17,040 --> 01:23:19,480
[reporter 3] He arrived on June 23.
1320
01:23:19,560 --> 01:23:20,960
That was two days ago
1321
01:23:21,040 --> 01:23:24,080
and left yesterday morning
bound for China.
1322
01:23:26,200 --> 01:23:28,760
[Jorg in German]
An agent always has an escape route.
1323
01:23:30,840 --> 01:23:35,960
We knew that Marsalek was in the office
until that Friday afternoon.
1324
01:23:36,600 --> 01:23:38,920
He supposedly said
1325
01:23:39,000 --> 01:23:41,960
he had to go to the Philippines
to clear the whole thing up.
1326
01:23:44,400 --> 01:23:48,360
He went for dinner
with Martin W. that evening.
1327
01:23:50,360 --> 01:23:53,000
Martin W., who he knew
from the Prinzregentenstrasse
1328
01:23:53,080 --> 01:23:56,120
and who used to be
in the Austrian secret service
1329
01:23:56,200 --> 01:24:00,320
together with an Austrian,
right-wing politician
1330
01:24:00,400 --> 01:24:02,240
booked Marsalek a flight.
1331
01:24:03,720 --> 01:24:07,360
Marsalek paid close to €8,000 in cash…
1332
01:24:08,920 --> 01:24:10,760
and then his trail disappeared.
1333
01:24:13,840 --> 01:24:15,400
He didn't go to the Philippines.
1334
01:24:15,480 --> 01:24:16,480
It doesn't make sense.
1335
01:24:16,560 --> 01:24:21,280
He couldn't have entered the country
because of quarantine regulations.
1336
01:24:22,480 --> 01:24:25,160
There are databases
where you can check flight data.
1337
01:24:25,840 --> 01:24:31,000
Since 2015,
he flew at least 60 times to Russia.
1338
01:24:31,520 --> 01:24:33,920
And there was one flight
1339
01:24:34,000 --> 01:24:38,800
from a small airport near Vienna to Minsk.
1340
01:24:41,040 --> 01:24:42,480
It's not far from Moscow.
1341
01:24:43,040 --> 01:24:48,320
The border to Russia is not controlled,
and that's where the trail is lost.
1342
01:24:49,520 --> 01:24:52,120
After that, it's just rumors.
1343
01:24:53,800 --> 01:24:55,960
[somber music plays]
1344
01:24:56,040 --> 01:24:57,960
We don't know for certain if Marsalek
1345
01:24:58,040 --> 01:25:01,400
was actually a secret-service informant
or not.
1346
01:25:03,480 --> 01:25:05,960
[Stephanie] Jan Marsalek was
very well-connected
1347
01:25:06,040 --> 01:25:08,680
in the secret service parallel world,
1348
01:25:08,760 --> 01:25:12,120
and that's why I think he won't be
that easy to find.
1349
01:25:15,760 --> 01:25:18,360
[Jorg] We know
that he's online occasionally
1350
01:25:18,440 --> 01:25:22,080
via an old Telegram account.
1351
01:25:22,600 --> 01:25:24,280
[interviewer talks indistinctly]
1352
01:25:24,800 --> 01:25:26,280
I can check again.
1353
01:25:29,080 --> 01:25:33,880
He's been online every few months.
1354
01:25:35,480 --> 01:25:40,880
The last time was on May 27, 2021.
1355
01:25:40,960 --> 01:25:45,200
[mischievous music plays]
1356
01:25:48,520 --> 01:25:50,760
[reporter 1]
The German parliament has started
1357
01:25:50,840 --> 01:25:52,960
a political inquiry into Wirecard,
1358
01:25:53,040 --> 01:25:55,960
one of the biggest scandals
of the German republic.
1359
01:25:56,040 --> 01:26:00,760
A financial disaster for those
who invested their money in Wirecard.
1360
01:26:02,360 --> 01:26:07,440
[reporter 2] It was
the first DAX-listed company to go bust.
1361
01:26:09,200 --> 01:26:11,800
[tense music plays]
1362
01:26:20,280 --> 01:26:23,520
[Jorg]
I think that Wirecard's inner circle
1363
01:26:23,600 --> 01:26:27,440
who knew what was really going on
was very small.
1364
01:26:28,600 --> 01:26:29,720
Certainly Marsalek.
1365
01:26:30,600 --> 01:26:34,720
The fascinating question is,
"What did Braun know about all this?"
1366
01:26:34,800 --> 01:26:38,000
[tense music intensifies]
1367
01:26:43,400 --> 01:26:46,040
[Lena] He wasn't emotional.
He was very tense.
1368
01:26:47,320 --> 01:26:50,120
And then he gave
a short opening statement.
1369
01:26:51,000 --> 01:26:55,120
"All I can say… is we were all deceived."
1370
01:26:56,160 --> 01:26:57,360
"I'm a victim."
1371
01:26:58,720 --> 01:27:02,000
And then his lawyer said
he won't answer any further questions.
1372
01:27:02,680 --> 01:27:07,080
He really sat there for three hours
and didn't answer.
1373
01:27:08,920 --> 01:27:10,000
[camera shutter clicks]
1374
01:27:10,080 --> 01:27:12,800
[Martin in English]
Reliving the whole experience now,
1375
01:27:12,880 --> 01:27:15,840
I feel naive
in not having seen certain things.
1376
01:27:16,880 --> 01:27:18,560
I do believe, personally,
1377
01:27:18,640 --> 01:27:23,360
that there's a possibility he did not know
what Jan Marsalek was doing,
1378
01:27:24,480 --> 01:27:27,400
but I think
it was his responsibility to know.
1379
01:27:29,920 --> 01:27:34,160
[Jorg in German] I think so far,
we only know the tip of the iceberg.
1380
01:27:34,240 --> 01:27:39,400
Unless Jan Marsalek turns up somewhere
and breaks his silence,
1381
01:27:39,480 --> 01:27:41,880
only then will we get the full story.
1382
01:27:44,720 --> 01:27:47,240
[Dan in English] If Jan's out there,
I'd love to talk to him.
1383
01:27:47,320 --> 01:27:50,040
I mean, I've spent years trying
to get inside his head.
1384
01:27:52,160 --> 01:27:55,040
Who was it
who was committing the fraud within?
1385
01:27:55,120 --> 01:27:58,200
You know,
what did he and Markus Braun talk about?
1386
01:27:58,720 --> 01:28:01,520
Was it a relief
when it came crashing down?
1387
01:28:04,160 --> 01:28:05,840
That's kind of interesting, right?
1388
01:28:05,920 --> 01:28:07,920
[dramatic music plays]
1389
01:28:27,480 --> 01:28:28,720
[dramatic music ends]
1390
01:28:37,480 --> 01:28:39,480
[somber music plays]
1391
01:31:38,640 --> 01:31:41,040
[somber music ends]