Skandal! Bringing Down Wirecard

Good movie!

Good movie!

Good movie!

Good movie!

All credit to Dan and the FT management for staying with a story even the German financial authorities tried to kill. Tenacious research and following of leads in Asia and Europe inspite of threats legal and otherwise reveals a real life financial scandal at one of Germanys largest companies. Fascinating insight into the world of short sells - not a very attractive bunch outside of two focuses American ladies who with others help lift the thick veil of secrecy of the fraudsters. Beats most financial dramas into small corner and makes you aware of the abilities of a determined fraudster to nearly make it even the German chancellor 'supported the company. Great insight into the talent and doggedness of a journalist never prepared to give up and of an editor prepared to take huge risks to get the story.

To be so quickly closed. It seems like a bit lacking to just leave it at company fall and Braun being arrested. I would hope there'd be some more coverage of consequences of the fraud when it comes to governmental involvement. Maybe part 2 or some future investigative piece will take a further look what else is implicated. Upon seeing this documentary I been in a classic internet rabbit hole to seek more information about involved actors, but there does not seem to be much more, or somebody did a pretty good scrape job to clean up the ties. Overall, I've seen some good pieces on Wirecard fraud, but this documentary provides a good amount of testimonies from people involved rather than just description of what happened.

Sauce

A very interesting documentary. Intense too, and challenging. You really have to concentrate to get everything. A bit too hard to follow sometimes maybe, the documentary sometimes opens pots it never closes, for example the investigation of the BaFin in the FT-Journalists. It is mentioned but no more. Leaves many questions unanswered. What was the role of the german regulators, why didn't they see anything and so on. But that is okay because it's a documentary out of the perspective of the FT-Journalists and these POV is - as I said - very interesting. At this point a special remark on the music which I really loved.

If you want to know the reason why people hate short sellers this film will give you a good idea. The cartoon character in his Cannes pile bemoaning what he didn't make by literally doing nothing is a perfect example. Their's, and the journalists glee at bringing down a company that employed thousands of people, and hundreds of thousands of investors, is quite hard to stomach. No doubt the company was dodgy to say the least but neither party were working for the good of mankind. The short sellers thinking only of the profit to be made by destroying the business, and the journalists revenge for having the tables turned on them. As a film it's well made and if you don't know the story worth the effort, personally I can't get over the unsurpassed delight at seeing the business fail.

Having watched the Wirecard: A Billion Euro Lie Sky documentary earlier this year, I was interested to see how this James Erskine Netflix piece deviated from the original. I'm pleasantly surprised as it takes an entirely different viewpoint, focusing mostly on the journalists, short sellers and MPs, rather than the former doc covering the whistleblowers and other influential parties. What ensues is an interesting value-add to the Wirecard story that helps to elevate the already thrilling saga of accounting fraud. The focus on Dan McCrum and team adds flavour to the narrative that was missing in the Billion Euro Lie doc. I do wish the whistleblowers were interviewed at the same extent however - though I imagine this may have been down to pre-existing agreements that would conflict. Overall, well worth a watch, and I'll await the third instalment of this documentary battle, coming from Amazon Prime, where they finally get Jan Marsalek to show his face.