Just more than four years after it shocked investors with a disclosure of what would be SA’s biggest corporate fraud, Steinhoff has closed the chapter of litigation that threatened to completely sink what was once Europe’s second-largest furniture retailer.

On Monday, the high court in Cape Town approved a R24bn settlement with investors who lost out after the discovery of “accounting irregularities” in December 2017 contributed to a decline of about R200bn in the company’s value. Steinhoff had faced combined claims of about R180bn, which threatened to push it to bankruptcy...