OpenLux: Gianfranco Macri controlled the wind activity from Luxembourg

While his brother was president, Gianfranco Macri managed the wind activity through a partnership in Luxembourg, a small country in central Europe which offers multiple tax advantages. SPF of Lares Corporation, Until now, unknown to the Argentine justice in the case investigating this operation, it was the firm that it controlled a structure of five companies, armed to act in the renewable energy sector.

Lares Corporation SPF represented in this business the last link in a chain of companies which crossed the ocean to settle in Spain then in Luxembourg with the aim of investing in local renewable energy projects. It was profitable: the intermediation between the purchase and sale of six wind farms generated profit of US $ 69.2 million in 2017.

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The ultimate beneficiary of Lares Corporation is Gianfranco Macri, according to official documents he reviewed THE NATION in alliance with the French newspaper The world and Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) for the OpenLux project. Although the activity of wind farms has displaced millions of dollars, the balance sheets presented by Lares in Luxembourg leave minimal traces of this investment.

“Lares Corporation was Gianfranco Macri’s company that got into renewable energy. It is a company that declares itself from the first moment in Argentina. Lares has invested in the wind farms through Rainbow Finance, a shared investment fund in which he not only invested, ”they said of Socma.

Lares was used to mine the money from the investment and sale of the wind farms, but according to the Socma Group, Taxation was carried out by the local companies Sidsel SA, Sideli SA and Usir Argentina, three companies that are part of the structure that ends in Luxembourg. These companies were taxed – they assured – both on the sale of wind farms and on the dividends received.

For this operation, the federal judge Marcelo Martínez de Giorgi is investigating two possible crimes: negotiations incompatible with the public service and fraud in the public administration. Gianfranco Macri is indicted, not the former president

Why did the Macri group use Luxembourg to invest in Argentina? “It was not for a tax issue, but for commercial matters. The Lares structure gave us the flexibility to seek funding abroad and allowed us to cease our activities at any time. Gianfranco Macri demanded that everything be taxed in Argentina, but he wanted to avoid bureaucracy and paperworkThey explained in the company. They also argued that through this corporate structure controlled by Lares, they invested “little or nothing” because the money came from local investors.

The numbers of Lares never exceeded 30,000 euros that the shareholder has paid into the initial capital of the company, according to the balance sheets he has reviewed THE NATION. The stationery was created by the firm Global Trust Services and has established its legal address in the residential rue Antoine Jans, at the same address as the specialized firm. Global Trust Services has appointed three of its employees as directors of Lares.

Lares’ balance sheets, which function like photographs of the company’s year-end financial statements, show the company made losses during its three years in Luxembourg, but these documents do not offer all the details for to rebuild its activity in those years. The maximum investment declared to the authorities of this country reached 23,000 euros at the end of 2018, when the wind farms had already been sold. The company is still active; the last internal movement took place on December 12, official documents indicate.

Wind farms

The company was closed four years ago, after the Spanish company Isolux obtained the concession of six wind farms by tender with the State. The last two tenders were executed by the government of Mauricio Macri, which sold these areas to Isolux in October 2016 when the company is in a worrying financial situation.

Isolux then sold its wind farms to companies Sidsel SA and Sideli SA, companies linked to the Macri family, as revealed by an investigation by the newspaper Perfil. These two companies were under the command of Usir Argentina SA, a company attached to Usir International (Spain). The latter, in turn, was managed by Rainbow Finance (Luxembourg). Lares is the last link in this chain.

Le Macri has invested US $ 25 million for the purchase of wind farms Loma Blanca I, II, III and IV and Miramar. In 2017, they sold this business for almost US $ 95 million the Goldwing and Genneia companies. For this operation, federal judge Marcelo Martínez de Giorgi is investigating two possible crimes: negotiations incompatible with the civil service and fraud in the public administration. The hypothesis of the cause is that Isolux could have functioned as a screen for Socma to do this business, with the complicity of public officials of the time, according to legal sources.

At the time of the investment in the wind farms, Socma was made up of Gianfranco Macri, his brother Mariano and the sons of the former president Macri, who in 2018 sold their stake in the company to Gianfranco Macri. Therefore, in the federal courts of Comodoro Py, Gianfranco is accused in the case of the wind farms; for the moment, the former head of state is not.

The judge is trying to reconstruct the corporate structure used to invest in wind farms through different test measures. Judge Martínez de Giorgi has sent international letters to get more information about the companies, but he is also trying to reconstruct the route taken by the money invested. The first task was blocked for lack of response warrants from Spain, where Usir Internacional SA is registered, a scale earlier than Luxembourg companies, reported legal sources. Regarding funds, Judge Martínez de Giorgi received information before the pandemic on an account in New York where the money used to buy the wind farms was transferred.

The judge is also investigating a US $ 5 million loan granted by Usir Argentina for the benefit of the former president’s brother. Lares, Luxembourg accounts show a similar transaction, but with lower figures: the company advanced money to its shareholder for $ 20,000 at the end of 2017, the year the parks were sold, according to the balance sheet . .

Gianfranco Macri, who moved to Uruguay when Mauricio Macri left Casa Rosada, is under investigation in another court case for tax evasion and money laundering with his brother Mariano. The Economic Criminal Justice is trying to determine the money that Gianfranco Macri laundered during the last tax opening, a fact that took place a month after the creation of Lares Corporation in Luxembourg.

Mariano macri bound in the book Brother, of journalist Santiago O’Donnell, that his family wanted to create foundations in Luxembourg to secretly control their Socma company and not have to answer for their debts. The youngest of the Macri has denounced Gianfranco and the former president’s children in court for keeping money on his father’s inheritance through an offshore company plot. The complaint is still pending.

With the collaboration of Ricardo Brom from LA NACION Data

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