Singapore sends businessman to Jail for 12 months in his role in Wirecard fraud

Singaporean businessman Henry Yeo pleaded guilty to three charges – conspiring to commit criminal breach of trust, falsifying invoices and laundering the benefits of criminal conduct. - STRAITS TIMES PHOTO: KELVIN CHNG

SINGAPORE, June 27 (Bloomberg): A Singapore judge handed a 12-month prison term to a businessman for conspiring to misappropriate money in the Wirecard AG scandal.

Henry Yeo, a director at Jacobson Fareast Marketing Services Pte, was convicted after pleading guilty to three charges in a Singapore state court on Tuesday.

"Wirecard Asia suffered a total loss of S$123,070 ($91,072) as a result of the accused’s participation in the conspiracy to dishonestly misappropriate money from its account,” deputy public prosecutor Vincent Ong said in court.

Two ex-employees of Wirecard Asia Holdings Pte were sent to jail last week for conspiring to misappropriate money in the first criminal convictions related to the massive fraud at the German payments firm.

Singapore’s financial regulator also imposed S$3.8 million in penalties on four financial institutions for breaches related to Wirecard.

Wirecard filed for bankruptcy in 2020 after acknowledging that 1.9 billion euros (US$2 billion) it had listed as assets probably didn’t exist.

In April, EY’s German business was banned for two years from accepting major new audit mandates, after it failed to uncover fraud at Wirecard AG. - Bloomberg