EXCLUSIVE: Ghosn’s undisclosed pay included payments from Dutch unit

January 23, 2019

Tokyo--Carlos Ghosn's undisclosed compensation when he headed Nissan Motor Co. <7201> included payments from a Dutch subsidiary of the Japanese automaker, informed sources told Jiji Press on Tuesday.

Ghosn has been indicted on charges of violating Japan's financial instruments and exchange law for allegedly failing to disclose about 9.1 billion yen of his total executive compensation at the Nissan group between fiscal 2010 and fiscal 2017, which is believed to have amounted to 17.03 billion yen.

He has annually received tens of millions of yen from the Dutch unit, Nissan International Holding BV, for several years until around fiscal 2017, but part of the amounts was not included in the parent company's financial statements, according to the sources.

The former Nissan chairman was obliged to fully report compensation from the Dutch unit, which is subject to Nissan's consolidated accounting, the sources said.

Separately, Nissan and its Japanese alliance partner, Mitsubishi Motors Corp. <7211>, said last week that their investigation has detected improper payments to Ghosn from their joint venture in the Netherlands between April and November 2018.

The payments from the joint venture, totaling 7.8 million euros, were conducted without necessary approval from its board, while they did not need to be disclosed, according to Nissan and Mitsubishi. Jiji Press