António Cotrim / Lusa
The Berardo Collection Association issued 990,000 titles to Berardo’s wife and children, which made the banks’ pledge on the art collection from 100% to 49.81%.
Businessman Joe Berardo has resorted to a suspicious operation with his family’s involvement to reduce Caixa Geral de Depósitos (CGD), BCP and Novo Banco (NB) access to his valuable art collection.
The transaction, held in 2016, consisted of issuance of 990 thousand titles Heritage of the Berardo Collection Association (ACB), an entity that holds the works of art. These titles were attributed to his wife, Carolina Berardo (deceased in 2022), and her children, Renato and Claudia Berardo. As a result, banks’ pledge on the collection was reduced from 100% to 49.81%. The prosecutor is investigating the operation.
The details arise in the civil process filed by the three banks against ACB in an attempt to recover credits about the Berardo group. Financial institutions claim the payment of 962 million euros, although the records indicate that the debt already exceeds 1.14 billion euros.
According to an ACB request included in the process in April 2016, Berardo’s relatives landed 990,000 equity securities, valued at 247.5 million euros to ACB. Carolina Berardo received 485 436 titles, while Renato and Claudia got 252,282 each, explains the.
In addition, the Association of Collections delivered works of art in the Value of 85 million euros to ACBreceiving titles of equal value. In total, these operations reduced the percentage of ACB titles under the pledge of banks to 49.81%.
Banks argue that this strategy It made it difficult to access artwork and prevented the financial fit to pay off the credits granted to the Berardo Group. ACB argues that the reduction of the pledged percentage does not compromise the economic value of the securities for debt collection purposes.
Joe Berardo also claims that the previous government, together with the banks, has prepared a plan for the appropriation of his art collection. According to the businessman, this plan involved meetings at the Ministry of Finance with then Minister Mário Centeno. In 2022, the collection was evaluated in about 1.5 billion euros.
During searches to ACB, in June 2021, when Berardo was arrested, the Central Department of Investigation and Criminal Action (DCIAP) seized documents related to ACB’s property securities. The judge responsible for the civil process of the banks against the association requested these documents to DCIAP, who sent them to the court.
