I have just watched a Sky News interview with the Financial Times (FT) reporter, who uncovered the accounting scandal at Wirecard...

In summary: €1.9BN of money was 'made up' by management, at a publicly listed business which - at peak - enjoyed DAX 30 status with a c€25BN market cap.

Can you imagine the miniscule size of the budget for the investigative journalists at the FT, versus the resources at EY (Ernst & Young) - whom had audited their accounts for the past ten-or-so years?...

During the interview, the journalist explained three 'red flags' - things that never made sense about Wirecard:

- their budget for R&D, as stated in accounts, was approximately 1/50th that of PayPal

- they didn't show in Google searches for 'payment providers' or fintech payment processing companies

- the CEO was evasive when asked questions as to the identity of customers which 'nobody had ever heard of'

Given how corporate govenance has been regulated since the scandals of WorldCom, Arthur Andersen, Enron etc., it's staggering this has happened in 2020, and in Germany... we (still) live and learn...