Carlos Ghosn in legal turmoil

Carlos Ghosn finds himself in turmoil. The 64-year-old leader was heard this Monday, November 19 in Tokyo by Japanese justice. The daily newspaper “The Asahi Shimbum” reports that investigators from the Japanese Capital District Public Prosecutors' Office searched Nissan's premises. 

The latter suspect Ghosn of not having declared his entire salary to the tax authorities, for an amount estimated at several hundred million yen. According to AFP, Nissan, which has already mentioned “serious facts”, must officially communicate at 21 p.m. local time (13 p.m. in France) from its headquarters in Yokohama near Tokyo. 

Arrived at Renault in 1996, Ghosn became director of operations at Nissan in 1999 following the formation of the Renault-Nissan alliance. Praised for having turned around the Japanese brand then on the verge of bankruptcy, he took on the role of CEO of Nissan in 2001 before being appointed president of Renault in 2005. 

In 2016, he oversaw the integration of Mitsubishi, also in difficulty, into the Renault-Nissan alliance and also became its president. On April 1, 2017, Ghosn relinquished his position as CEO of Nissan to Hiroto Saikawa while continuing to serve as head of the board of directors. 

Reuters underlines that Renault shareholders approved the payment of a remuneration of 7,4 million euros for the year 2017 while Ghosn also received 9,2 million euros for his last year as CEO of Nissan. 

Difficult for the moment to estimate the impact of the Renault boss's legal troubles on the future of the program F1 from the French manufacturer. Remember that Ghosn had validated the return of Losange as a manufacturer team at the end of the 2015 season.

In any case, the effect on Renault shares was not long in coming, since the stock has fallen by around 13% since the opening of the Paris Stock Exchange this morning.