“Another problem is that the registry has no memory. When the company CRS Holding, of footballer Cristiano Ronaldo, was dissolved in May 2020, its name disappeared at the same time. All history [a été] erased from shelves overnight. ‘It’s a huge loophole,’ says Thom Townsend (the director of the British NGO Open Ownership, nldA). ‘The Panama Papers have shown that criminal companies regularly change ownership so as not to be traced.’ ”
In the series of articles published this Monday morning by a consortium of journalists from data extracted from the trade register since 2016 and from the register of beneficial owners since its launch in 2019, journalists point to its “lack of memory”.
It is as logical as it is wrong. Let’s explain this with the case of Cristiano Ronaldo used by journalists.
On May 22, 2020, the footballer decides to transfer his holding, CRS Holding, and its share capital slightly above 16 million euros to Portugal, under the name of “CR Lifestyle Unipessoal Limitada”. From the 30 days of this decision, the footballer had the obligation to register his holding company in Portugal,
in the commercial register
.
However, does this make the data of the holding company in Luxembourg “disappear”? No. If it no longer appears – logically – in the RBE since the company no longer exists in Luxembourg and there is therefore no longer an economic beneficiary, all deeds registered in Luxembourg are still available in the trade register.
Luxury hotels, combat sports and… carrots
It is quite possible to read there, according to the latest report (2019), that the turnover amounted to 300,000 euros, after the player had to clear debts of more than 8 million euros in 2017 .
Or even that his inclinations to tax structuring are not new. In 2018, Italian journalists had already looked into the device, organized in Luxembourg by lawyer Paolo Panico, at the head of Private Trustees who had already organized the repatriation of the footballer’s assets from his holding company in Jersey to Luxembourg.
He finally paid the 18.8 million euros claimed by the Spanish tax authorities when he left for Juventus in Turin, but the balance sheet shows three participations.
Two are also already known, in Pestana CR7 (50%), with the Williams sisters, distinguished tennis players, in the construction of luxury hotels – an activity he is also developing with Carlton Palácio (50%). These two companies are linked to the luxury hotel group Pestana, which has hotels in Lisbon, Madeira, Marrakech, New York, Madrid and Paris.
The third entry, UFC Co-Investment Holdco controls the Ultimate Fighting Championship, the world’s largest mixed martial arts organization, which CR7 has entered along with other stars like Sylvester Stallone, sisters Serena and Venus Williams. , Maria Sharapova or Ben Affleck.
In the documentary “Parallel Worlds”, the footballer describes his love for combat sports.
If the carrots were already starting to cook in 2019 for the footballer and his formidable tax organization, his latest stake, 10% in a business selling prepackaged carrots, had been transferred to his holding in Portugal.
The return, already, of the child prodigy to the country.
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