They Lied!

What Investec and Peter Gray knew and lied about in South Africa’s second-biggest corporate fraud on record

- Martin Welz

YET AGAIN, WE RETURN TO THE subject: the strategies employed by Investec and its auditors KPMG with the help of Peter Gray to avoid being held accountable for Investec’s role in – and as a major beneficiary of – Brett Kebble’s theft of shares worth billions from Randgold, a company that Kebble directed.

Most of the stolen share sales were processed by a stock brokerage specially set up for the purpose in 2002 by Kebble and his close associate, ex-Société Générale (SocGen) CEO Peter Gray, in order to prevent these transactions from being scrutinised by outsiders (more below).

The proceeds of the sales of shares stolen from Randgold & Exploration Company (Randgold) were largely channelled through JCI, a company controlled by Kebble, but also through Investec Bank UK and various other illicit channels associated with Kebble.

To protect themselves, Investec and KPMG have jointly contrived to ensure that JCI never produced legally compliant audited annual accounts, as these would have to reflect a massive contingent liability to Randgold, and expose Investec and its appointed directors to huge damages claims, liquidation and possible criminal prosecution.

KPMG have throughout the saga also been the auditors of Investec which, as bankers, had been intimately involved in the affairs of both Kebble and JCI since 1997.

For the years 2006 through to 2012, KPMG racked up auditing and forensic fees from JCI to the tune of R93 million.

Despite an undertaking given by JCI in May 2016 that they would produce audited annual statements for JCI, no compliant audited accounts have been produced since then. None. So what’s the apparently insurmountable problem?