René Benko refuses to go public, even though his opaque business network has been on fire for months. At the end of November, Signa Holding suffered the largest bankruptcy in Austrian economic history; the over-indebtedness of this holding company amounts to approximately five billion euros. In second and fifth place in this negative ranking are Signa Prime and Signa Development, two other core companies from the financial juggler’s realm.
At first glance, it was a bit surprising that Hans Peter Haselsteiner ventured into the media on Wednesday evening to defend the wrong path of his partner Benko, who, according to insiders, has now built a house of cards consisting of more than a thousand companies. At second glance that was not the case. Because Haselsteiner, with his family foundation, is the largest co-investor of the real estate speculator (14 percent of the ailing holding company), there is a lot of money at stake for the former Strabag builder.
“A very painful mistake”
But the defense expected by insiders did not materialize. On the contrary: “I relied on a business model that was very risky,” the almost 80-year-old construction magnate admitted on ORF’s “ZiB 2”. And: He allowed a lot of money to be burned in trade. “That was a very painful mistake.”
Strong criticism of Benko
The old boss of construction company Strabag initially tried to point to the problems of the real estate sector in general as the cause of the imbalance (“The interest rate landscape has changed radically”, “Signa, like the entire sector, has ended up in a vortex”), but was unexpected Strong criticism of the inventor of the opaque construction: ‘René Benko played an active shareholder role. He did intervene in the board. He had the reins in his hand. He instructed his managers.”
That is exactly why Benko is “responsible as a director. He should stand up and say, ‘Yes, I share this responsibility.'” The founder’s luxurious lifestyle also contributed to the negative public image: “René Benko’s lack of modesty is part of this image that he to the world audience. It is his personal responsibility. He will have to wear them.”
“We had no plan B”
When asked why Benko did not make a decisive contribution to the rescue of Signa, co-partner Haselsteiner said: “Benko has lost a large part of his assets. I don’t know if he would be able to make significant investments.” In any case, the Signa Group had been hoping for new capital for too long – ‘and had no plan B.’
In the ORF interview, Haselsteiner indicated that he was willing to contribute up to 25 million euros to Signa Development Selection AG, which is also insolvent. It is now important to protect small investors from greater damage. He, Haselsteiner, will still have a word to say to his friend Gusenbauer. About the millions in fees that the former chancellor and former chairman of the supervisory board of Strabag collected from Benko.
The bottom line is that it remains a ‘defeat’ for Haselsteiner, also for himself as an entrepreneur: ‘I seriously wonder what I have missed. And why I didn’t ask more critical questions. An in-depth test would have been useful.”
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.
