Parmalat's auditor insisted Friday that it had no role in any illegal schemes to hide the multi-billion dollar hole in the food company's balance sheet, which first came to light last week and led the conglomerate to ask for bankruptcy protection.
Prosecutors are investigating about 20 Parmalat officials, including founder Calisto Tanzi, for fraud and other charges concerning the suspected falsification of company documents.
Police involved in the investigation last week police raided the Milan offices of Parmalat auditor Grant Thornton, carting off boxes of documents.
The chief of Grant Thornton's Italian operations, Lorenzo Penca, said in a statement Friday, "If anything, it was we who were victims of grave fraud."
Grant Thornton stated "it never came up with or cooperated in producing any bookkeeping or fiscal construction aimed at hiding the real administrative and financial situation of the company of Parmalat, for which it exclusively carried out auditing."
Parmalat revealed Dec. 19 that Bank of America Corp wasn't holding about US$4.9 billion of its funds, as the Italian company had reported in September.
Since then, the estimated amount of money missing from its balance sheet has ballooned.
Italian reports say a total of around US$12 billion could be missing from Parmalat accounts after what may have been 15 years of false accounting.
The company formally filed for bankruptcy protection Wednesday and the Industry Ministry appointed business-turnaround expert Enrico Bondi, who was named Parmalat CEO after Tanzi was ousted earlier this month, to develop a restructuring plan to save the company, which employs thousands worldwide.
Bondi was working hard through the holiday and will present his plan, which must be approved by the government, by the end of January at the latest, the ANSA news agency said.
Meanwhile, Tanzi hasn't been seen in Italy for several days and has offered no public defense since the scandal broke. Italian reports say he is abroad, but has informed investigators he is willing to appear before them.
On Thursday, six life insurance companies that loaned money to two Parmalat units in the Cayman Islands announced they had asked a judge there to help them get back their money after the company defaulted on the loans.
They asked the judge to help them get control of two Parmalat units -- Food Holdings Ltd and Dairy Holdings Ltd -- after they each defaulted on a loan payment earlier this month, the company's lawyers said in a statement Thursday.
The statement, from the New York law firm of Cadwalader Wickersham & Taft LLP, said the loans had been guaranteed by Parmalat. It didn't say how much they were worth.
The companies involved in the petition are: Jefferson-Pilot Life Insurance Co; Monumental Life Insurance Co; New York Life Insurance and Annuity Corp; Principal Life Insurance Co; Transamerica Occidental Life Insurance Co; and Transamerica Life Insurance Co.
Parmalat, which has annual sales of around US$9.2 billion, produces and sells milk, yogurt, juice and other food products in Europe, the US and around the world.
Its base in the wealthy city of Parma is about 400km northwest of Rome.
SEMICONDUCTORS: The German laser and plasma generator company will expand its local services as its specialized offerings support Taiwan’s semiconductor industries Trumpf SE + Co KG, a global leader in supplying laser technology and plasma generators used in chip production, is expanding its investments in Taiwan in an effort to deeply integrate into the global semiconductor supply chain in the pursuit of growth. The company, headquartered in Ditzingen, Germany, has invested significantly in a newly inaugurated regional technical center for plasma generators in Taoyuan, its latest expansion in Taiwan after being engaged in various industries for more than 25 years. The center, the first of its kind Trumpf built outside Germany, aims to serve customers from Taiwan, Japan, Southeast Asia and South Korea,
Gasoline and diesel prices at domestic fuel stations are to fall NT$0.2 per liter this week, down for a second consecutive week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) announced yesterday. Effective today, gasoline prices at CPC and Formosa stations are to drop to NT$26.4, NT$27.9 and NT$29.9 per liter for 92, 95 and 98-octane unleaded gasoline respectively, the companies said in separate statements. The price of premium diesel is to fall to NT$24.8 per liter at CPC stations and NT$24.6 at Formosa pumps, they said. The price adjustments came even as international crude oil prices rose last week, as traders
SIZE MATTERS: TSMC started phasing out 8-inch wafer production last year, while Samsung is more aggressively retiring 8-inch capacity, TrendForce said Chipmakers are expected to raise prices of 8-inch wafers by up to 20 percent this year on concern over supply constraints as major contract chipmakers Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and Samsung Electronics Co gradually retire less advanced wafer capacity, TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said yesterday. It is the first significant across-the-board price hike since a global semiconductor correction in 2023, the Taipei-based market researcher said in a report. Global 8-inch wafer capacity slid 0.3 percent year-on-year last year, although 8-inch wafer prices still hovered at relatively stable levels throughout the year, TrendForce said. The downward trend is expected to continue this year,
POWERING UP: PSUs for AI servers made up about 50% of Delta’s total server PSU revenue during the first three quarters of last year, the company said Power supply and electronic components maker Delta Electronics Inc (台達電) reported record-high revenue of NT$161.61 billion (US$5.11 billion) for last quarter and said it remains positive about this quarter. Last quarter’s figure was up 7.6 percent from the previous quarter and 41.51 percent higher than a year earlier, and largely in line with Yuanta Securities Investment Consulting Co’s (元大投顧) forecast of NT$160 billion. Delta’s annual revenue last year rose 31.76 percent year-on-year to NT$554.89 billion, also a record high for the company. Its strong performance reflected continued demand for high-performance power solutions and advanced liquid-cooling products used in artificial intelligence (AI) data centers,
RSS