The ex-Credit Suisse banker was the head of the Wirecard supervisory board for twelve years.
(Photo: Wirecard)
Dusseldorf Former Wirecard supervisory board chairman Wulf Matthias is dead. The long-time supervisor of the former Dax group died at the end of October at the age of 76. Matthias’ lawyer Holger Matt from Frankfurt confirmed this to the Handelsblatt on Friday.
Matthias, who studied economics and business administration, worked for several banks in the past, most recently as a member of the Management Board of Credit Suisse Germany, as Managing Director at Bank Sarasin and Senior Advisor for MM Warburg.
He started at Wirecard in 2008. Since then, Matthias has been a member and chairman of the supervisory board.
For years, the supervisory body consisted only of him, the management consultant Alfons Henseler and Stefan Klestil, the son of the former Austrian Federal President Thomas Klestil. The suspected fraud at the payment service provider from Aschheim, which ultimately led to the collapse of the group, also occurred during her tenure.
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When Wirecard collapsed, however, Matthias was no longer the head of the supervisory board. He had already resigned as chairman of the committee in January 2020 and was only a normal member from then on. Officially, it was said that Matthias wanted to initiate “a generation change” with the decision at his own request.
Investigators searched the home and office
It was a special honor for him to be able to accompany “this extraordinary company and its management team”, Matthias was quoted as saying in a press release at the time. Wirecard AG has “created a growth and success story that is unprecedented in Germany’s recent economic history”.
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Five months later, the then Dax group had to admit that an alleged billion-dollar fortune did not exist in the Philippines. Wirecard filed for bankruptcy and left billions in damage. The company’s business became a case for the public prosecutor’s office – and with it the role of Wulf Matthias.
In June 2021, investigators searched his office and private home. It was about the suspicion of aiding and abetting infidelity. Specifically, Matthias is said to have approved loans worth millions to dubious companies in Asia for years – including loans to the company Senjo, headquartered in Singapore, which was later renamed Ocap.
These loans are now also in focus in court. Wirecard’s former CEO Markus Braun, the former chief accountant Stephan von Erffa and the former governor of the group in Dubai, Oliver Bellenhaus, have had to answer to the District Court I in Munich since this week.
In the indictment, the public prosecutor’s office lists Matthias as “other persecuted person”. However, the banker’s health had been severely restricted for a long time. For this reason, he was not questioned as a witness or as a suspect for a long time. Wulf Matthias made no statement about the allegations during his lifetime.
More: The answers to these six questions will decide Markus Braun’s future.