Ghosn denies ‘he passed trading losses to Nissan’

Bloomberg

Carlos Ghosn, the embattled former chairman of Nissan Motor Co., denied reports that he passed on personal trading losses to the carmaker, the first comment from the executive who is detained on numerous allegations of financial misdeeds.
Ghosn acknowledged consulting Nissan about the collateral related to the contract, but didn’t transfer the losses to the automaker, said Motonari Otsuru, a lawyer representing the former chairman.
Otsuru, the former director of the same Tokyo prosecutors’ office department that is now investigating Ghosn, spoke to Bloomberg News after meeting with the jailed official.
The Asahi newspaper reported that Ghosn may have passed $14.9 million in personal investment losses relating to a derivatives contract on to the company in 2008.
While Ghosn is denying wrongdoing in this matter, the 64-year-old hasn’t commented publicly on a slew of other charges, including Nissan saying he misused company money for personal matters and understated income. Ghosn is beginning to make attempts to defend himself after his arrest on November 19 in Tokyo, after which the boards of Nissan and partner Mitsubishi Motors Corp. sacked him as their chairman. Since the detention, Japanese media have published details of the alleged violations on an almost daily basis.
Ghosn, who hasn’t made any public statements since he was detained, denies wrongdoing in connection with the allegations, broadcaster NHK reported.
Among the best-paid executives in both France and Japan, Ghosn stands accused of under-reporting his pay by about $71 million in the eight years through March, the Nikkei reported earlier.
Nissan provided Ghosn with six houses, including residences in Tokyo and New York, a company official said earlier, asking not to be identified.