How This Man Exposed Japan's Biggest Corporate Fraud

Michael Woodford was working at the Olympus corporation when he became suspicious of some shady transactions. Little did he know that his discovery was about to snowball into an almost $5 billion fraud, the largest in Japan's history. In this episode we take out the twisting story of the Olympus fraud.

ColdFusion/ Burn Water Music: @ColdFusionmusic

ColdFusion Podcast:

ColdFusion Socials:

[ColdFusion]

Hey guys. Wanted to jump in and address the few typos and that one weird pronunciation. Taking steps to ensure this doesn't happen again. I really should stop working late into the nights! I promise I'll become the "epi-tomey" of quality.

Thanks for keeping me in check.

[Sci-Que]

Even though they were caught, just take a look at the punishment. They got suspended sentences. It happens everywhere. financially solid white-collar criminals get away with crime and the little guy found guilty of lesser crimes goes to prison.

[isbestlizard]

The Japanese every time he emailed and mentioned the discrepencies, probably though "Damn it he's blackmailing us with the leverage he has, promote him to keep him quiet!' Until they did that all the way to the CEO, and realised he wasn't blackmailing them but actually wanted to investigate the fraud XD

[TheArtunism]

“Hey this is weird, can I get an explanation”

“How about a promotion instead?”

[link]

Shocking how these white-collar criminals got off with just suspended sentences. It's disheartening to see the stark contrast in punishments for different types of crimes. Kudos to Michael Woodford for his bravery in standing up for what's right. 🙌

[danielhale]

He was REALLY smart to flee Japan. If he'd stayed, the company would have set him up as the fall guy (the foreigner often takes the blame in Japan) and their justice system could have very easily just locked him away with no effort at justice. Japan is a very beautiful and interesting place, but you never want to be staring down its "justice" system, especially as an outsider, especially when a big company is pulling strings to make a problem go away. He _might_ have been fine with all the international attention, but that's a bad gamble.

[ozhoo]

Yet only 2 were ever actually sent to prison. Proving once again that financial manipulation is not a crime.

[squidgert]

I live in Japan and was around when the scandal broke. Japanese talked more about Woodford, the foreigner, bringing this shame to light.
Yeah, you can’t trust foreigners but with a twist here, playing along with the company’s accounting shenanigans.

[baronvonhoughton]

Billions in fraud - Suspended sentences.
Possession of drugs - Up to ten years inside.

[BewareTheLilyOfTheValley]

I don't know how they thought giving the guy the highest seat of the company would just shut him up 😂 They made it even easier for him to demand answers because you can't just tell the CEO "No, you're not entitled to that information". Usually, the tactic is to demote such people, I had to keep giving the People's Eyebrow each time it was said that they promoted him 🤨

[midimusicforever]

A CEO whistleblower is quite unique! Well, he was fired before blowing the whistle, but he was intending to blow the whistle while he was CEO!

[spamtes]

I used to work at Olympus in Japan (I'm Canadian). Theres a big portion of the story that should be considered. Kikukawa inherited this financial problem from the previous CEO's actions, and started because of the bubble burst. He was dead loyal to the company and former CEO and was doing what the directors were telling him to keep the company a float, even if it meant putting his name on the line. He was loyal just like the previous CEO. You need to understand Olympus didnt want to resort to laying off employees since most of them were also affected by the bubble bursting. They were trying to buy time to fix the problem without putting their staff on the street. None of the execs stole any money or benefitted from these actions. The execs were doing this to be loyal to their employees and customers.

[CYBRK]

"Where's the money?"

"Shut up, you're the boss now"

[jennw]

There’s something hilarious about them continually promoting Woodford to shut him up until he was at the highest position then firing him.

[WanJae]

"I guess Japanese business wasn't as clean as most of us thought." Just about any book on Japanese business practices would've painted you a different picture. A Japanese company (historically) took good care (by Japanese standards) of their owners and employees and customers first, their country and partners second, and literally everything else was fair game to be sacrificed for the above. That was known, understood, and expected, and frankly considered a virtue. What Olympus did, until recent times, could've EASILY been spun by the media (and typically was) as them just doing what they needed to do to survive.

(To be clear: What's different about Olympus is they got caught. They sure as heck didn't invent these practices.)

[lunaskye]

I remember back when you only had 100, 000 subscribers and I was confused because the quality of these videos is really up the with the top talent on YT. So happy to see you get the success you deserve! Keep up these videos! I love listening to these cases from around the world which I would otherwise not have known about.

[charlesmoss]

Another oddity - I worked for a UK plc that got bought by a Japanese company - we all failed the corporate morality test thing we had to do - the question was around basically paying bribes - we all ticked the good grief no box, the correct answer was where the culture was such it may in some circumstances be acceptable - a very different approach!

[luciafrost]

My dad was an engineer at gyrus after Olympus bought them he moved over to Olympus’s engineering department. After the scandal came out they let him go. My dad was never the same after that. He never had a stable job afterwards. This scandal literally ruined his life.

[adamsmith]

Good on Woodford to risk not only his career but personal safety to do things the right way. I'm glad I found your channel because your stories are informative and streamlined without needless filler to stretch out the video. Thank you for the work you put into these to give me insight or just things to think about.

[emboyarobinson]

One of the best documentary channel on YouTube. Much thanks and keep them coming.