Japanese pachinko king Kazuo Okada assets frozen

Content Team 3 years ago

Kazuo Okada allegedly violated directors’ responsibilities in managing ‘Okada Manila’ casino resort in the Philippines by overspending

Kazuo Okada, Japan’s 16th richest person, former chairman of Universal Entertainment and pachinko tycoon assets freezing case is set due to financial mismanagement.

Kazuo Okada was filed by two companies now controlled by his son Tomohiro for compensation this year in January, after alleging that he violated directors’ responsibilities in managing ‘Okada Manila’ casino resort in the Philippines by overspending.

The two plaintiffs are Universal Entertainment Corporation and Tiger Resort Asia Limited, and the defendant is Kazuo Okada.

The billionaire is accused of transferring $3.1 million from Tiger Resort Leisure and Entertainment (the parent company to Okada Manila) between November 2016 and March 2017.

The court granted a temporary injunction order prohibiting Kazuo Okada from transferring assets of Okada Holdings Co., Ltd. and Okada Yirin Co., Ltd.

At that time, the judge believed that the application was reasonably controversial and therefore approved a temporary injunction. However, at the hearing of the formal injunction, the plaintiff applied to freeze the defendant’s assets of up to 620 million U.S. dollars in Hong Kong, but the judge did not think that the compensation would be so high if the plaintiff won the case.

The order also needs to disclose all of the defendant’s assets in Hong Kong. Hence, today Judge Gao handed down a verdict today after the hearing and refused to grant a formal injunction prohibiting K.Okada from transferring assets in Hong Kong.

This is not first time Okada was charged due to financial mismanagement.

In 2015, he was accused by Universal Entertainment’s board of directors of using a Hong Kong subsidiary to loan about 135 million Hong Kong dollars to purchase art collections.

Last year, he was accused of embezzling public funds of 20 million U.S. dollars. He was also fired from his own company Universal Entertainment.

In August 2018, Kazuo Okada was arrested by the Independent Commission Against Corruption in Hong Kong on suspicion of multiple corruption crimes but was granted bail the next day.