Flight records of Ghosn escape falsified to hide auto exec's travel, jet firm says - Fox Business

George Mason University National Security Institute director Jamil Jaffer discusses whether Lebanon will extradite former Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn.

ANKARA, Turkey — A Turkish airline company whose jets were used to fly former Nissan Chairman Carlos Ghosn from Japan to Lebanon said an employee falsified records and that Ghosn's name did not appear on any documentation related to the flights.

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Ghosn earlier this week jumped bail in Japan and fled to Lebanon rather than face trial on financial misconduct charges in a dramatic escape that has confounded and embarrassed authorities.

How he was able to flee Japan, avoiding the tight surveillance he was under while free on 1.5 billion yen ($14 million) bail, is still a mystery, though Lebanese authorities have said he entered the country legally on a French passport.

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Ghosn's daring escape spanned three continents and involved private planes, multiple passports and international intrigue. Turkey detained seven people Thursday as part of an investigation into how he passed through the country, and they were appearing in court Friday. The private DHA news agency reported that those detained were four pilots, a cargo company manager and two airport workers.

Also Friday, Istanbul-based MNG Jet said it had filed a criminal complaint in Turkey concerning the illegal use of its jet charter services.

It did not say who the complaint was against, but it said one company employee, who was under investigation by the Turkish authorities, admitted to falsifying records and "confirmed that he acted in his individual capacity" without MNG Jet's knowledge.

The company said it had leased two separate private jets: one private jet from Dubai to Osaka , Japan, and Osaka to Istanbul and another private jet from Istanbul to Beirut.

Former Nissan Chairman Carlos Ghosn is driven through Tokyo after posting 1 billion yen ($8.9 million) in bail in March 2019. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko. File)

"The two leases were seemingly not connected to each other. The name of Mr Ghosn did not appear in the official documentation of any of the flights," MNG Jet said in a statement. The statement did not say who the jets were leased to.

NISSAN DIRECTORS: WHO HELPED CARLOS GHOSN?

On Thursday, Interpol issued a wanted notice for Ghosn. Lebanese Justice Minister Albert Serhan told The Associated Press in an interview that Lebanon “will carry out its duties,” suggesting for the first time that the automotive titan may be brought in for questioning. But he said Ghosn entered the country on a legal passport, and he appeared to cast doubt on the possibility Lebanon would hand Ghosn over to Japan.

Shortly after the Interpol notice, Ghosn issued a statement — his second this week — seeking to distance his Lebanese wife and family from any role in his escape.

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“The allegations in the media that my wife, Carole, and other members of my family played a role in my departure from Japan are false and misleading. I alone organized my departure. My family played no role,” he said.

Ghosn, who is Lebanese and also holds French and Brazilian passports, was set to go on trial in Japan in April. He arrived in Lebanon on Monday via Turkey and hasn't been seen in public since. In a statement Tuesday, he said he fled to avoid “political persecution” by a “rigged Japanese justice system.”

CARLOS GHOSN ON JAPAN ESCAPE: 'MY FAMILY HAD NO ROLE'

His lawyer in France, Francois Zimeray, told Japanese public broadcaster NHK TV that he was in frequent contact with Ghosn since he arrived in Lebanon, and Ghosn appeared to be filled with “a fighting spirit." Ghosn was eager to start clearing his name at a news conference next week, Zimeray said.

Ghosn, who grew up in Beirut and frequently visited, is a national hero to many in this Mediterranean country with close ties to senior politicians and business stakes in a number of companies. People take special pride in the auto industry executive, who is credited with leading a spectacular turnaround at Nissan beginning in the late 1990s and rescuing the automaker from near-bankruptcy.

Ghosn, who is charged in Japan with under-reporting his future compensation and breach of trust, has repeatedly asserted his innocence, saying authorities trumped up charges to prevent a possible fuller merger between Nissan Motor Co. and Renault.

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2020-01-03 11:20:43Z
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U.S. Stock Futures Fall After Airstrike Kills Iranian Commander - Yahoo Finance

(Bloomberg) -- U.S. stock-index futures fell after an American airstrike in Iraq killed a top Iranian commander.

S&P 500 Index futures contracts expiring in March were down 1.1% as of 10:19 a.m. in London after the attack that killed Qassem Soleimani, the Iranian general who led the Revolutionary Guards’ Quds force. Dow Jones Industrial Average contracts and those on the Nasdaq 100 also fell.

Oil spiked, with futures in New York and London surging 4% or more, as Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei vowed “severe retaliation” after the death of one of his country’s top commanders. Gold also surged. The Stoxx Europe 600 Index dropped 0.7%.

“The ‘severe retaliation’ aspect is possibly what is scaring the markets as it could mean that there will be a counter-attack versus American diplomats,” said Alberto Tocchio, chief investment officer at Colombo Wealth in Lugano, Switzerland. “Markets could use this excuse to take some profits as sentiment and positioning are possibly too high.”

The S&P 500 Index climbed 0.8% to a fresh record in New York on Thursday, boosted by tech shares including Apple and Alphabet. The gain extended the benchmark gauge’s 29% advance for 2019.

In addition to the Middle East situation, investors are keeping an eye on geopolitical tension surrounding North Korea, where Kim Jong Un said he was no longer bound by his pledge to halt major missile tests and would soon debut a “new strategic weapon.”

“We are only into the third day of the new year, and a big fat dollop of geopolitical uncertainty has landed on investors’ desks already,” Jeffrey Halley, a senior market analyst at Oanda in Singapore, wrote in a note. “Readers now know why I am reluctant to look past 1Q of the new year at this stage,” Halley said, adding that the holiday-shortened week shifts the focus to “the real start of the trading year” on Monday.

MARKETS:

E-Mini futures on S&P down 1.1%E-Mini futures on Dow Jones down 0.9%E-Mini futures on Nasdaq 1.3% lowerVIX Index trading 23% higherWTI crude futures up 3.7% to $63.43/bblBloomberg spot dollar index up 0.2%

ECONOMIC DATA:

10:00 - Nov. Construction Spending MoM est. 0.4% (prior -0.8%)10:00 - Dec. ISM Manufacturing est. 48.9 (prior 48.1)10:00 - Dec. ISM New Orders (prior 47.2)10:00 - Dec. ISM Prices Paid est. 48.1 (prior 46.7)10:00 - Dec. ISM Employment (prior 46.6)14:00 - Dec 11 FOMC Meeting Minutes15:00 - Dec. Wards Total Vehicle Sales est. 17.00m (prior 17.09m)

EARNINGS:

Companies reporting earnings include Lamb Weston

--With assistance from Ksenia Galouchko.

To contact the reporters on this story: Jackie Edwards in Sydney at jedwards160@bloomberg.net;Namitha Jagadeesh in London at njagadeesh@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Lianting Tu at ltu4@bloomberg.net, Kurt Schussler, Paul Jarvis

For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com

©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

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2020-01-03 10:36:00Z
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New Clues Emerge in Carlos Ghosn’s Escape From Japan - The New York Times

TOKYO — New clues emerged on Friday on how Carlos Ghosn pulled off his audacious escape from Japan, as a Turkish charter jet company said its planes were used illegally to pull off the plan, while the Japanese news media reported that surveillance camera footage showed the disgraced auto industry mogul leaving his Tokyo home on Sunday by himself.

Taken together, the disclosures paint a picture of a dash across Japan to a waiting plane that swept Mr. Ghosn across Asia to Lebanon. Still, most of the details of Mr. Ghosn’s getaway remain murky and unconfirmed. The authorities in Japan and Turkey still appear to be investigating how he did it.

Mr. Ghosn — who has maintained his innocence — was facing four charges of financial wrongdoing in Japan and was set to go on trial sometime next year. But he escaped instead, saying that he did not trust what he called the “rigged” Japanese justice system to give him a fair trial. He built and once ran the Nissan-Renault auto alliance, one of the world’s biggest car-making empires, but was arrested after arriving in Tokyo in November 2018.

In Turkey on Friday, MNG Jet, an aircraft charter company, said one of its employees had falsified records to remove Mr. Ghosn’s name from the official documentation for two flights. The company said the employee confessed to acting alone, without management’s knowledge. MNG Jet did not disclose the employee’s name.

News outlets in Turkey reported this week that Mr. Ghosn left on a plane from Osaka, Japan, late Sunday aboard a business jet and landed at Istanbul Ataturk Airport. He then switched planes and flew to Beirut, the reports said.

The news accounts match the flight records of a Bombardier business aircraft operated by MNG Jet that took off from Osaka just after 11 p.m. local time and landed in Istanbul about 12 hours later, according to data from FlightAware, a flight tracking service.

MNG Jet said it had no indication the two flights were connected. It said it filed its criminal complaint in Turkey on Wednesday and that it “hopes that the people who illegally used and/or facilitated the use of the services of the company will be duly prosecuted.”

It is not clear how Mr. Ghosn, who was under heavy surveillance in Tokyo, could have eluded the authorities and make his way to Osaka, which is roughly 300 miles west of Tokyo.

In Japan on Friday, news outlets reported that Mr. Ghosn walked out of his Tokyo home alone on Sunday but never came back. The news reports cited anonymous sources with knowledge of footage of the cameras surrounding his rented house in a central district of the city.

Prosecutors are investigating whether Mr. Ghosn, after leaving his home, met up with a group that helped his escape to Lebanon, according to the national broadcaster NHK and the economic daily Nikkei Shimbun.

The footage described in the news reports was from security cameras installed in front of the two-story house in an upscale neighborhood in the city center, the outlets reported, citing sources close to the investigation. Three surveillance cameras had been installed above the doorway of Mr. Ghosn’s house as part of a bail agreement that placed tight restrictions on his movements and ability to communicate with the outside world.

The mystery has fed into some colorful theories. At least one Lebanese news media outlet had reported that Mr. Ghosn was smuggled out of his home in a musical instrument box. Lebanese officials have said Mr. Ghosn — who is a citizen of France, Lebanon and Brazil — arrived legally with a French passport, even though he had agreed to surrender three of his passports to his lawyers as a condition of his bail.

The Japanese authorities have stayed conspicuously silent about the escape of the country’s most high-profile criminal defendant. Prosecutors raided Mr. Ghosn’s Tokyo home on Thursday afternoon. Mr. Ghosn’s departure appeared to be timed for the eve of Japan’s weeklong New Year’s holiday, the country’s most important.

Still, signs are mounting that Japanese officials are responding. On Thursday, Albert Serhan, the Lebanese justice minister, said that the country’s public prosecutor had received a red notice from Interpol related to Mr. Ghosn’s case, according to the state-run National News Agency. Such a notice is issued for individuals wanted for prosecution or to serve a sentence.

Interpol’s online list of public red notices did not show an entry for Mr. Ghosn as of early Friday.

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2020-01-03 08:59:00Z
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US jobless claims edge lower but trend points to uptick in filings - CNBC

The number of Americans filing claims for jobless benefits edged lower last week, a positive signal for the U.S. labor market amid recent signs that new claims may be trending slightly higher.

Initial claims for state unemployment benefits decreased 2,000 to a seasonally adjusted 222,000 for the week ended Dec. 28, the Labor Department said on Thursday.

Economists polled by Reuters had expected 225,000 new claims last week.

While claims have been volatile in recent weeks around the U.S. holiday season and end of the year, longer-term averages point to a slight increase in new claims.

The four-week moving average of initial claims rose by 4,750 to 233,250, the highest level since January 2018.

Still, the underlying trend in claims remains consistent with a labor market that is resisting signs of weakness in other parts of the economy, such as a slowdown in U.S. manufacturing and lackluster business investment. Economists have attributed the weakness to uncertainty around a U.S.-China trade war launched under U.S. President Donald Trump.

In November, the U.S. unemployment rate fell back to 3.5%, the lowest in nearly half a century.

The drop in claims in the latest week unwound a surge in new claims three weeks earlier that appeared to reflect a late Thanksgiving Day this year compared to 2018. By the end of the latest week, the number of new claims was at its lowest since the Nov. 30 week.

Labor market strength is underpinning consumer spending, keeping the economy on a moderate growth path despite headwinds from trade tensions and slowing global growth that have weighed on manufacturing.

Thursday's claims report also showed the number of people receiving benefits after an initial week of aid rose 5,000 to 1.73 million for the week ended Dec. 21.

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2020-01-02 13:32:00Z
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Irrational exuberance? Why last year’s stellar returns may have been a reversal of ‘excessive pessimism’ - MarketWatch

On the first working day of 2020, let’s take a moment to appreciate the virtues of a vice: laziness.

Say what you will about new year’s resolutions, but last year, letting a boring old S&P 500-tracking index fund do its work was one of the best investment decisions around.

Including dividend reinvestment, the S&P 500 SPX, +0.29%  returned 33% in 2019, outperforming virtually every national index and very nearly every investment strategy.

For the decade, according to Deutsche Bank, the S&P 500 returned a cool 256%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite COMP, +0.30%  returned 347%.

So the obvious question is, can the gains continue?

Tim Duy, a University of Oregon professor who closely tracks the Federal Reserve, plotted the return of the S&P 500 on a logarithmic scale to show that the current gains are nothing like the acceleration from the late 1990s.

“This doesn’t surprise me as I think fears of financial excess are overplayed, effectively a case of fighting the last war,” he writes. Duy also notes the level shift down since the 2007-09 recession, which he says is suggestive that a less optimistic view of the world, has already been priced into the market.

Duy also examined S&P 500 performance after the first Fed rate increase of the cycle, and finds the current performance in line with the pre-2015 average. Duy says the current performance is not “an unexplainable deviation from fundamentals” but rather an expected recovery from excessive pessimism.

The buzz

There was little new information for traders to chew on, besides the People’s Bank of China deciding to cut bank reserve requirements to help shore up the world’s second-largest economy.

Data released Thursday showed Initial jobless claims fell 2,000 from an upwardly revised 224,000, showing layoffs are still rare.

While not market moving, the saga of Carlos Ghosn is still getting attention, as details of how the former Nissan and Renault executive left Japan for Lebanon still remain murky, and possibly could involve being smuggled in a musical instrument case. Turkey has detained seven individuals in connection with Ghosn’s brief travel through Istanbul.

The markets

U.S. stock futures were pointing to a strong start on Thursday, with futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average YM00, +0.57%  gaining 164 points. See Market Snapshot.

European SXXP, +1.02% and Asian stocks ADOW, +0.26%  also rose.

In currency markets, the British pound GBPUSD, -0.5509% sagged while most of the other major pairs saw little movement.

Random reads

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio says Domino’s Pizza DPZ, +0.18%  exploited those who celebrated the new year in Times Square by charging $30 for pizza.

Also on the pizza front, ‘Papa’ John Schnatter vows to eat 50 pizzas in 30 days.

A New York state assemblyman who tweeted there was no excuse for driving impaired was arrested days later for, yes, driving impaired.

In the U.K., cassette sales reached a 15-year high last year.

Need to Know starts early and is updated until the opening bell, but sign up here to get it delivered once to your email box. Be sure to check the Need to Know item. The emailed version will be sent out at about 7:30 a.m. Eastern.

Follow MarketWatch on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook.

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2020-01-02 12:53:00Z
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Japan tries to solve the mystery of Carlos Ghosn's audacious escape - CNN

Japanese media reported that Tokyo district prosecutors entered the property on Thursday. CNN affiliate TV Asahi also reported that prosecutors were working with police to access CCTV video around his home as part of their investigation.

Ghosn — the former chairman of Nissan and Mitsubishi Motors, and former chairman and CEO of their alliance partner, Renault — had been awaiting trial in Japan on charges of financial wrongdoing, including allegations that he understated his income for years and funneled $5 million of Nissan's money to a car dealership he controlled. He was ousted from his posts at Nissan (NSANF) and Mitsubishi Motors following his arrest in November 2018, and later resigned from Renault (RNLSY).

As a condition of being released on bail, Ghosn was required to stay in Japan. But his case was completely upended earlier this week after Ghosn revealed that he had fled Japan for Lebanon to escape what he called a "rigged" justice system.

It is still not clear how Ghosn, who is a citizen of France, Brazil and Lebanon, was able to slip out of Japan. Reuters and the Financial Times have reported that he was smuggled out of Tokyo by a private security company -— a plot that the media organizations say took months to concoct.

The governor of Istanbul said in a statement Thursday that Turkish police have detained seven people in connection with an investigation into Ghosn's "illegal escape" from Japan. Anadolu news agency said that Ghosn traveled via the city's Ataturk airport. Police detained four pilots of a private airline, a company manager and two ground staff at the request of the Istanbul prosecutor, according to the statement from the governor's office.

Flight tracker Flightradar24 showed a private jet flying from Osaka, Japan, to Istanbul and then another continuing to Lebanon at the time Ghosn is said to have arrived in the country.

CNN Business has been unable to verify the circumstances behind his departure, and Ghosn did not elaborate on his escape in his public statement earlier this week.

Japan's justice ministry, the Tokyo prosecutor's office and the city's district court have not responded to requests from CNN Business this week for comment about Ghosn's escape. Government offices are closed this week for the New Year holiday.

Legal experts and political analysts say that Japan is probably trying to figure out whether Ghosn violated immigration law when he left the country — not that there's much of a chance of forcing him to return.

Prosecutors in Tokyo are now likely retracing Ghosn's moves through Japan, collecting surveillance footage and searching for potential collaborators said Nobuo Gohara, a former prosecutor who now runs a compliance and law office in Japan.

Gohara added that Ghosn's trial is almost certainly now canceled. The bigger question, he said, is how Japanese authorities will respond to Ghosn's attacks on them, now that he is able to speak freely about his detention.

Ghosn has repeatedly denied the charges against him, and claimed that his arrest was part of a plot to remove him from the automotive empire he built. In his statement this week, he said he would "no longer be held hostage by a rigged Japanese justice system where guilt is presumed, discrimination is rampant, and basic human rights are denied."

Japan can't force Lebanon to send Ghosn back, said Keith Henry, the founder and representative director of Asia Strategy, a research and policy firm based in Tokyo. The two countries have no extradition agreement.

"It is a bigger deal for [Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo] Abe and Japan than for Ghosn," Henry said. "No matter what they do now, it is very difficult to overcome the embarrassment of letting go one of the most high-profile suspects" of corporate scandal since Japan's economic boom that followed World War II.

— CNN's Isil Sariyuce in Istanbul contributed to this article.

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2020-01-02 12:34:00Z
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Japan tries to solve the mystery of Carlos Ghosn's audacious escape - CNN

Japanese media reported that Tokyo district prosecutors entered the property on Thursday. CNN affiliate TV Asahi also reported that prosecutors were working with police to access CCTV video around his home as part of their investigation.

Ghosn — the former chairman of Nissan and Mitsubishi Motors, and former chairman and CEO of their alliance partner, Renault — had been awaiting trial in Japan on charges of financial wrongdoing, including allegations that he understated his income for years and funneled $5 million of Nissan's money to a car dealership he controlled. He was ousted from his posts at Nissan (NSANF) and Mitsubishi Motors following his arrest in November 2018, and later resigned from Renault (RNLSY).

As a condition of being released on bail, Ghosn was required to stay in Japan. But his case was completely upended earlier this week after Ghosn revealed that he had fled Japan for Lebanon to escape what he called a "rigged" justice system.

It is still not clear how Ghosn, who is a citizen of France, Brazil and Lebanon, was able to slip out of Japan. Reuters and the Financial Times have reported that he was smuggled out of Tokyo by a private security company -— a plot that the media organizations say took months to concoct.

Turkish state media reported Thursday that seven people have been detained in Istanbul on suspicion of helping Ghosn flee to Lebanon. Anadolu news agency said that Ghosn traveled via the city's Ataturk airport, where police detained four pilots of a private airline, two ground staff and the director of a cargo company. Flight tracker Flightradar24 showed a private jet flying from Osaka, Japan, to Istanbul and then another continuing to Lebanon at the time Ghosn is said to have arrived in the country.

CNN Business has been unable to verify the circumstances behind his departure, and Ghosn did not elaborate on his escape in his public statement earlier this week.

Japan's justice ministry, the Tokyo prosecutor's office and the city's district court have not responded to requests from CNN Business this week for comment about Ghosn's escape. Government offices are closed this week for the New Year holiday.

Legal experts and political analysts say that Japan is probably trying to figure out whether Ghosn violated immigration law when he left the country — not that there's much of a chance of forcing him to return.

Prosecutors in Tokyo are now likely retracing Ghosn's moves through Japan, collecting surveillance footage and searching for potential collaborators said Nobuo Gohara, a former prosecutor who now runs a compliance and law office in Japan.

Gohara added that Ghosn's trial is almost certainly now canceled. The bigger question, he said, is how Japanese authorities will respond to Ghosn's attacks on them, now that he is able to speak freely about his detention.

Ghosn has repeatedly denied the charges against him, and claimed that his arrest was part of a plot to remove him from the automotive empire he built. In his statement this week, he said he would "no longer be held hostage by a rigged Japanese justice system where guilt is presumed, discrimination is rampant, and basic human rights are denied."

Japan can't force Lebanon to send Ghosn back, said Keith Henry, the founder and representative director of Asia Strategy, a research and policy firm based in Tokyo. The two countries have no extradition agreement.

"It is a bigger deal for [Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo] Abe and Japan than for Ghosn," Henry said. "No matter what they do now, it is very difficult to overcome the embarrassment of letting go one of the most high-profile suspects" of corporate scandal since Japan's economic boom that followed World War II.

— CNN's Isil Sariyuce in Istanbul contributed to this article.

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2020-01-02 10:29:00Z
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