President of Casino is investigated for manipulating the market – 01/06/2023 – Market

Jean-Charles Naouri, 74, president of French supermarket group Casino, was arrested in Paris on Thursday (1st) by police on suspicion of market manipulation, according to Reuters.

Naouri was questioned by authorities in a preliminary investigation into market manipulation, corruption and insider trading, France’s Financial Prosecutor’s Office said, according to information from the news agency.

Contacted by Reuters, the Casino group declined to comment as of this writing. In Brazil, the French group controls GPA (Grupo Pão de Açúcar), owner of the retail brands Pão de Açúcar, Compre Bem, Market Extra and the Colombian Éxito.

The investigation into Naouri was launched in February 2020 and targets alleged stock price manipulation between 2018 and 2019, according to financial prosecutors.

Last week, Casino announced the opening of a procedure that allows the negotiation of its debt with creditors, estimated at 6.4 billion euros (R$ 34.7 billion) until the end of December 2022. Of this total, 5, 5 billion euros (R$ 29.8 billion) are related to its activity in France.

The company must repay around 3 billion euros (R$ 16.2 billion) over the next two years. The conciliation period should last four months.

The group had also disclosed an agreement to transfer a hundred supermarkets to the French distribution group Les Mousquetaires (The Musketeers), owner of Intermarché, the third largest in the sector in France.