South Africa Probes Seven Accounts for Steinhoff Insider Trading

(Bloomberg) -- South Africa's financial regulator is investigating seven trading accounts that sold Steinhoff International Holdings NV shares in the weeks leading up to the global retailer's disclosure of accounting irregularities and subsequent share-price collapse a year ago.

The accounts belong to individuals, trusts and corporate entities and the Financial Sector Conduct Authority is looking for evidence of insider trading, it said in a statement Friday. The probe is close to completion.

The news comes after Bloomberg reported that former Steinhoff Chief Executive Officer Markus Jooste advised friends via a mobile-phone text message to sell the retailer's shares days before the stock collapsed. The regulator has been made aware of the text, two people familiar with the situation said in October. It's not clear whether anyone acted on its contents.

Steinhoff's shares have lost more than 96 percent since the accounting scandal erupted on Dec. 5, 2017, and the owner of Conforama in France and Poundland in the U.K. has sold assets and restructured about 10 billion euros ($11.4 billion) of debt to stave off collapse. Auditors at PwC are reviewing the accounts, but the matter is so complex that their report has been postponed until February.

Read More: Steinhoff Ex-CEO Told Friends to Sell Stock Before Collapse

The trading-accounts investigation is one of three cases the FSCA has registered. The second probe focuses on Steinhoff's release of audited 2015 and 2016 annual financial statements and its 2017 interim results. The third involves a report by short sellers Viceroy published on Dec. 7, 2017, less than 48 hours after Steinhoff's shock announcement.

The FSCA is receiving assistance from foreign regulators and has interviewed numerous individuals and obtained “extensive” documentation, it said. Once the PwC probe has been concluded it's possible that further investigations into insider trading and false and misleading statements may be initiated, the regulator said.

Speaking to lawmakers in Cape Town in September, Jooste, 57, said he wasn't aware of any financial irregularities on the day he resigned. He instead blamed the crisis on a protracted dispute with Austrian business partner Andreas Seifert, which triggered investigations into Steinhoff by European regulators and tax authorities, which are ongoing.

To contact the reporter on this story: Janice Kew in Johannesburg at jkew4@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Eric Pfanner at epfanner1@bloomberg.net, John Bowker, John Lauerman

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