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Institutional investors sue OW Bunker IPO banks JP Morgan and Carnegie

Institutional investors sue OW Bunker IPO banks JP Morgan and Carnegie
Danish institutional investors are suing banks Morgan Stanley and Carnegie over the IPO prospectus of bankrupt OW Bunker.

A group of 24 Danish investors has added the two issuing banks for the IPO – Morgan Stanley and Carnegie - to a DKK767m claim for damages over the bankruptcy of OW Bunker in 2014. The addition of the banks for liability over OW Bunker's IPO prospectus adds to the existing defendants of OW Bunker A/S, relevant Altor units and the former board of directors and day-to-day management of OW Bunker.

OW Bunker held its IPO just seven months before it declared bankruptcy after revealing $150m in hedging losses and an alleged $125m fraud at its Singapore-based subsidiary Dynamic Oil Trading.

“The consortium has decided to extend the group of defendants to include the issuing banks Morgan Stanley and Carnegie. This decision is based on new information in extensive exhibits from the bankruptcy estate, which we were given access to only this spring. We believe that the banks knew about OW Bunker’s speculative activities and that the banks contributed to misleading investors. Against this background, we believe that they may be liable to pay damages,” said Tomas Krüger Andersen, head of legal, Investments, ATP, on behalf of the consortium of investors.

In early April 2016 the group of investors brought legal proceedings with a view to obtaining compensation and determining responsibility and action is pending in the Danish Eastern High Court.