Google – AFP, 16 April 2013
Pedestrians
pass before a branch of Nomura Securities in Tokyo on
October 29, 2012
(AFP/File, Yoshikazu Tsuno)
|
ROME —
Italian police on Tuesday seized 1.8 billion euros ($2.3 billion) destined for
Nomura and placed the former chief of the Japanese bank's European operations
under investigation in a fraud probe over a derivatives deal with troubled
Italian lender Monte dei Paschi di Siena.
A statement
from the prosecutor's office in Siena said it had ordered the seizure of
"a total of around 1.8 billion euros from Nomura International"
including 88 million euros in commissions and 1.7 billion euros in collateral
posted by Monte dei Paschi for Nomura.
Prosecutors
also seized a total of 14.4 million euros from three former managers of Banca
Monte dei Paschi di Siena who are under investigation.
It placed
under investigation Sadeq Sayeed, the former head of Nomura for Europe, Middle
East and Africa, as well as Raffaele Ricci, a managing director for fixed
income sales.
Sayeed
stepped down from Nomura in 2010.
The
statement said Sayeed and Ricci were suspected of "gravely
obstructing" the activities of supervisory authorities and putting out
"false statements".
Contacted
by AFP, Nomura declined to comment.
The world's
oldest bank, Monte dei Paschi di Siena has been at the centre of a massive
fraud scandal since January which has uncovered several derivative deals put in
place by its former management in order to disguise losses.
The bank
itself last month began a lawsuit in civil court against Nomura, Deutsche Bank
and two of its former managers for their role in these operations.
Investors
cheered the prosecutorial action, with Monte dei Paschi's shares jumping by
more than 3.0 percent on the Milan stock exchange by 1100 GMT, while the
benchmark index was down 0.46 percent.
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