Signa investors raise allegations against insolvency administrator Erhard Grossnigg. picture alliance / HERBERT PFARRHOFER, Getty Images / Javier Ghersi, filo
On December 22nd, the Signa Holding shareholders were nervous. The administrator Christoph Stapf informed a small group about the progress of the insolvency process; Wunderwuzzi René Benko’s real estate and trading group had gone bankrupt a few weeks earlier. The shareholders feared having to write off hundreds of millions of euros that they had invested in the company conglomerate. The conversation lasted less than an hour, and the manager did not mention an explosive incident that would befall the shareholders the next day.
The Signa subsidiaries Prime and Development “urgently!!!” need 350 million euros to somehow save the companies, reorganizer Erhard Grossnigg wrote to the group on December 23rd. Grossnigg was appointed by Signa to restructure the two valuable companies. René Benko bundled his most valuable properties in Prime, and he developed luxury projects in Signa Development and sold them on.