German Money Transporter Accused of Embezzlement

Germany's largest money transport firm has filed for bankruptcy after allegedly embezzling millions of euros from customers. The move could lead to some empty ATMs, but stores aren't worried they'll run out of money.

Heros filed for bankruptcy for all its 23 units on Monday after police investigators announced they were investigating the Nordcash subsidiary for embezzling up to 300 million euros ($356.8 million) from customers including retail giants Metro group and Karstadt as well as banks.

Nordcash employees allegedly pocketed the money over a period of several years, using some for themselves as well as injecting it into Heros subsidiaries to keep the company going.

Heros handled about 50 percent of the German money transport market and moved about 600 million euros per day. The company employs around 3,000 people.

While banks and stores were moving quickly to shift transport to other companies, officials said that automatic teller machines (ATMs) could run out of money.

But a spokeswoman for the German Retailers Association said that she didn't expect the bankruptcy to have a major impact on business.

Deutsche Welle 02/2006