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Stephanus Johannes Grobler, a former director of Steinhoff, has been handed a R358,750,000 ($18.9 million) fine related to fraudulent financial statements covering the 2014, 2015 and 2016 financial years, as well as the 2017 half year.
During that period, Grobler served as company secretary, head of treasury and in-house legal counsel of the Steinhoff group. He was also a director of several Steinhoff subsidiary companies.
On Wednesday, March 20, 2024, the Financial Sector Conduct Authority announced it was fining former chief executive Markus Jooste R475 million for contravening the Financial Markets Act. The regulator said Jooste issued false or deceptive statements about Steinhoff International that he knew or reasonably ought to have known were false, misleading or deceptive.
The authority waived any fine against Steinhoff’s former European finance chief, Dirk Schreiber, in return for his cooperation. Schreiber had already been sentenced to three and a half years in prison by German authorities.
By the afternoon of March 20, 2024, Jooste would have known about the R475 million fine and that Schreiber had cooperated with investigators. He died by suicide on Thursday, March 21, 2024.
An investigation by the Financial Sector Conduct Authority found that Grobler contravened the Financial Markets Act, specifically provisions prohibiting the direct or indirect making or publication of false, misleading or deceptive statements.
The financial statements issued by Steinhoff during the relevant period were found to be false, misleading or deceptive in respect of material facts that were either misstated or omitted. The assessment was made with reference to the information available at the time and the circumstances under which the statements were presented to the market.
