Signa Holding of real estate juggler René Benko is said to have deliberately published balance sheets too late and knowingly accepted fines – because they are ridiculously low. Justice Minister Zadic calls for stricter rules.
Signa’s bankruptcy has sparked a debate about the fines for failing to publish company balance sheets. Experts criticize the current rules as too lax. Justice Minister Alma Zadic now wants to make improvements. The current fines of 700 to 3,600 euros are not impressive for large companies.
At Signa, the Public Prosecution Service suspects that the publication of the balance sheets has been postponed with the aim of misleading creditors. “The current bankruptcies at Signa dramatically demonstrate that we need new rules to prevent the targeted and profit-driven manipulation of balance sheets,” Zadic told “Krone”.
The sentences have not been increased in thirty years
It cannot be the case that large companies like Signa consciously accept fines to hide their actual economic situation from regulators, investors and also their employees. “Here we have to think about higher penalties. After all, these have not been increased since the early 1990s.”
In the future, it should no longer be possible for large companies to use deception to deliberately conceal the company’s economic situation. Bon mot on the side: Ex-SPÖ Chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer was chairman of the supervisory board of Signa Development AG and is now making demands of 6.3 million euros in the insolvency proceedings.
Source: Krone
I’m Ben Stock, a journalist and author at Today Times Live. I specialize in economic news and have been working in the news industry for over five years. My experience spans from local journalism to international business reporting. In my career I’ve had the opportunity to interview some of the world’s leading economists and financial experts, giving me an insight into global trends that is unique among journalists.
