German prosecutors file first charges in €300m 'Operation Chargeback' PSP fraud; Unzer founder Hüllemann indicted

Prosecutors filed the first charges at a court in Koblenz over a €300m global card-fraud scheme that ran 2016–2021, misusing 4.3 million cardholder records across 193 countries via ~2,000 fake subscription sites. Those indicted include Mirko Hüllemann, founder of Unzer (formerly Heidelpay), ex-Wirecard manager Brigitte Häuser-Axtner and Ruben Weigand.

Investigators say intermediaries funnelled payments between shell merchants and German PSPs including Unzer, Payone and Nexi Germany (formerly Concardis); 44 people face charges in total, six of them former PSP employees.

This moves the German acquiring market's biggest legacy compliance scandal from investigation to prosecution, and it names three PSPs that between them serve a large share of German card acceptance. Merchant-facing reputational risk and heightened supervisory attention on onboarding and transaction-monitoring controls now attach to incumbents that are actively defending mid-market portfolios against the SoftPOS challengers.

The case also strengthens the regulatory argument for stricter PSP merchant-due-diligence rules in the PSD3/PSR negotiation.

• Whether the Koblenz court admits the indictment and sets a trial date
• Whether BaFin opens or escalates supervisory action against the named PSPs
• Whether merchant churn at Unzer or Payone becomes visible in German acquiring share data

• news.bloombergtax.com
• heise online — background on the investigation and the PSPs involved