A Columbian drug lord’s brother and the biggest privately-owned FinTech in Europe could be heading towards a legal battle threatening to delay Klarna’s public listing.
The brother of deceased Columbian drub lord Pablo Escobar, portrayed in the first two seasons of the Netflix series Narcos, has a company called Escobar Inc, which is suing FinTech giant Klarna.
Escobar Inc is claiming that the Swedish company owes it €400,000 for thousands of flashy Escobar-branded mobile phones that were sold on Klarna’s platform, Sifted reported.
However, Klarna argued that it is withholding the money because the phones were never delivered to the customers who bought them, claiming that the money should therefore be refunded.
Escobar Inc’s Swedish CEO Olof Gustafsson denied any wrongdoing, saying that the company has evidence that it sent the phones and that Escobar Inc has proven to Klarna that it has paid for the postage of sending the phones.
Gustafsson said Escobar Inc could file a temporary injunction and consequently halt Klarna’s planned US IPO.
Sifted’s Mimi Billing did note that while lawsuits have delayed public debuts in the past, it is usually due to things like patent disputes or litigations, and not due to a single trader conflict.
Klarna was named as Europe’s most valuable privately-owned FinTech company in September after it raised a $650m round and pushed its valuation past the $10.6m mark, also landing it a place in the coveted decacorn club.
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