elumeo SE: Jewellery retailer faced insolvency / Berliner Sparkasse refused to extend Multimillion Loan / Growing scepticism among elumeos suppliers / Shareholder demands special auditor

BANGKOK, THAILAND / BERLIN, GERMANY – EQS Newswire – 10 October 2019 -�In
view of the latest revelations on the financial situation of the German jewelry
trading group elumeo SE, anchor shareholder Ottoman Strategic Holdings (Suisse)
S.A. is once again strengthening its demand for a special auditor to
investigate the actual economic situation and management decisions under the
chairmanship of Board Chairman Wolfgang Boyé. According to the latest internal
company information, elumeo SE was on the verge of insolvency shortly after the
main lender Berliner Sparkasse refused to extend a loan worth millions. In the
meantime, the sceptical voices of suppliers in India, who no longer regard
elumeo as a reliable trading partner, are also increasing.

After questionable decisions of the managers Wolfgang Boyé, Thomas Jarmuske and Bernd Fischer, the company is in free fall and pulls the subsidiaries along. According to a decision of the Thai Labour Court of 12 September 2019, former PWK employees who have received neither salary nor statutory severance pay can now dispose of the company’s property (file no. Ror 757/2662). The employees can now immediately enter the premises of PWK, identify all assets and offer them for sale to compensate for their unpaid salaries and severance payments.

In connection with the financial decline of PWK Jewellery Company in
Thailand and the loss of over 600 jobs, Bernd Fischer, Wolfgang Boyé and Thomas
Jarmuske are being investigated in Thailand. The public prosecutor’s office in
Berlin also investigated the three managers, but closed the investigation. At
present, the General Prosecutor’s Office is investigating whether the
investigations should be resumed. Elumeo SE also has to deal with a
multi-million lawsuit. In the complaint, the elumeo managers are accused of
having ordered jewellery worth over 30 million euros from the jewellery
manufacturer PWK, a subsidiary of the company elumeo, and of having paid only a
small fraction of this amount, which eventually led to the illiquidity of PWK.

In the meantime, elumeo has also massively lost credibility among its suppliers
of jewellery and precious stones in Jaipur (India). After elumeo SE had driven
its jewellery manufacturing subsidiary PWK Jewellery Company into the wall in
Thailand, the Berlin jewellery retailer now procured jewellery and precious
stones from third parties, including companies in Jaipur (India). There,
however, scepticism about eluemo SE as a reliable and liquid trading partner is
growing in view of the latest developments and relevations. The stumbling CEO
of elumeo, Ingo Stober, felt this scepticism massively at the last Hong Kong
Jewellery & Gem Fair.

In the summer of 2018, the liquidity situation of both Elumeo SE and the
Thai PWK deteriorated. Sales figures collapsed. The eleumeo Mangament was not
able to sell nearly as many pieces of jewelry via TV and the Internet as
predicted. To the surprise of the elumeo management, the bank did not extend a
million loan granted by Berliner Sparkasse to Elumeo SE. The company was thus
faced with a delay.

In view of the massively falling sales of elumeo SE, which sells far less
jewellery through distribution channels such as Juwelo TV than previously
announced, the jewellery manufacturing subsidiary PWK Jewellery proved to be a
burden for the group, which now wanted to get rid of it together with the
workers. However, this did not prove to be that easy, as under Thai labour law
every dismissed employee is entitled to a statutory severance payment. In view
of the financially disastrous situation and the threat of bankruptcy, elumeo
wanted to avoid these severance payments for over 600 employees. In fact, Bernd
Fischer directly instructed the PWK directors to “try to determine how
much personnel/costs could be reduced without severance pay”. The
directors informed Fischer that this was illegal in Thailand. Among the
employees of PWK Jewellery Company Bernd Fischer is referred to as the
“Architect of Misery”.

A trick to embellish Elumeo SE’s balance sheet was to get rid of the high
debts to the (grandchild) subsidiary PWK without further ado. A
“subordination agreement” agreed between the (newly appointed)
managing director of Silverline and Juwelo Deutsch-land GmbH (Juwelo – another
subsidiary of Elumeo SE) on 6 September 2018 served this purpose, with the
result that all claims of PWK passed on to Juwelo (or Elumeo SE) via Silverline
no longer needed to be serviced under group law for an indefinite period of
time.

Despite the subordination agreement, which meant that not only all old
receivables, but also newly arising receivables of PWK against the companies of
the Elumeo Group no longer needed to be serviced for an indefinite period of
time, on 17 September 2018 the member of the Board of Directors Jarmuske
ordered another jewelry delivery from PWK for the Juwelo, which was delivered from
Thailand to Berlin on 24 September 2018 and invoiced at 347,408.78 euros. The
jewellery delivery was received by the Juwelo, but was not paid for as a
result.

Attorney Dr. Gerhard Strate: “It is obvious that this is a fraud to the
detriment of PWK. It is indisputable that this invoice has not been paid to PWK
to this day. The public prosecutor’s office in Berlin does not claim the
contrary either.

Ottoman Strategy Holdings points out that both elumeo’s management and
Shareholder Frankfurt Performance Management FPM under Raik Hoffmann had
prevented the appointment of a special auditor at previous general meetings to
investigate management’s business.

The issuer is solely responsible for the content of this announcement.