THE FORMER boss of Wirecard has been charged with fraud, breach of trust and accounting manipulation following the collapse of the firm amid a major accounting scandal in June 2020.

Markus Braun has been charged by Munich public prosecutors after a 21 month criminal investigation into practices which saw the firm crash into administration in June 2020, The Financial Times (FT) first reported.

Braun has been in custody since July 2020 and denies any wrongdoing, claiming he is also a victim of the fraud.

Two other senior wirecard managers have been charged - the firm's finance director and head of accounting Stephan von Erffa, and a former Dubai-based manager of a Wirecard subsidiary firm.

Prosecutors allege bosses were aware the firm was loss making from 2015, and that its annual results for 2015 to 2018 were "deceitful" and reported cash held in accounts in Asia that did not exist and revenues from outsourced operations.

Wirecard soared in value to €24bn (£20bn) at its peak in 2018 and was hailed as one of the country's great fintech success stories.

The firm's former chief operation officer Jan Marsalek has been on the run since June 2020 and is likely to be hiding in Russia, according to sources cited by the FT.

(c) 2022 City A.M., source Newspaper