So far, all allegations in the Cum-Ex affair have bounced off him. Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) is the cool, mellow Hanseatic when it comes to the biggest tax robbery in financial history.
That’s how it was when he appeared in the investigative committee of the Hamburg Senate, when the former mayor of the Hanseatic metropolis fended off the opposition’s attacks without much effort.
Sometimes he could no longer remember the details, sometimes he vehemently defended himself against allegations that he had subsequently approved fraudulent cum-ex tax carousels of the private bank MM Warburg.
Although he had to admit that he had met with the shareholders of the long-established financial institution on the matter. To this day, the opposition in the committee of inquiry suspects political cronyism, but there is no clear evidence.
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Nor did a raid by the Cologne public prosecutor’s office at the end of September shed more light on the former Scholz confidant and ex-SPD member of the Bundestag Johannes Kahrs.
A few meager indications that could indicate that the alleged tax swindlers of the Warburg Bank were cheated here – nothing more. According to FOCUS online information, the Cologne Justice Center is currently not assuming that the findings so far could be sufficient to charge Kahr’s former assistant Scholz. Especially since he has been silent about things so far.
The core of the affair is about allegedly illegal tax gifts from the Hamburg tax office for large companies. In 2016, the prosecutors in Cologne informed the tax authorities in the north that those responsible at the Warburg Bank were being investigated for criminal cum-ex transactions.
With this scam, taxpayers were cheated nationwide by an estimated twelve billion euros. The model describes a stock trading circle with (cum) and without (ex) dividend entitlement, in which the tax authorities reimburse capital gains tax twice that was not previously paid.
Service providers, consultants and banks were involved in the illegal transactions between 2007 and 2012 at various control points, which later shared the illegal profit from the dividend stripping among themselves.
In addition to dozens of well-known financial institutions, the Warburg Bank is said to have been heavily involved in the cum-ex swamp for years. In 2016 alone, 47 million euros in unjustly approved tax refunds to the Hanseatic financial institution threatened to become time-barred.
The millions came from allegedly illegal cum-ex transactions by the bankers. Despite the warnings of the Cologne public prosecutor’s office, the Hamburg tax office for large companies, after negotiations with the financial institution, let the deadline for reclaiming the millions pass. In 2017 it was about 43 million euros in tax refunds.
The then Federal Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble (CDU) had to instruct the recalcitrant Hanseatic citizens twice to get at least this money back from the Warburg Bank. In the meantime, an investigative committee of the Hamburg Parliament is examining the processes.
In particular, one investigates the suspicion of whether the Hanseatic SPD political leadership exerted influence in order to get the tax gifts for the bank. At the time, Olaf Scholz was the first mayor of the Alster.
The current Federal Chancellor had met several times with the bank owners Christian Olearius and Max Warburg on the matter. Scholz confirmed the meetings in the investigative committee, but could no longer remember the content of the conversation, and at the same time he denied any influence.
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During searches in 2018 at the top of the bank, the Cologne public prosecutor’s office seized the diary of Olearius, a Warburg shareholder at the time. The notebooks give the investigators a deep insight into the attempts of the bankers to prevent the threatened cum-ex repayments of a good 90 million euros with the help of the SPD in Hamburg.
In a diary entry, after a meeting with Hamburg’s Mayor Scholz, the Warburg shareholder expressed confidence that there was no need to worry about the repayment.
The then finance senator and current city boss Peter Tschentscher was apparently involved in the Warburg case. This is suggested by a handwritten note in the case that appeared in the investigative committee.
Tschentscher always defended himself against the accusation of political bargaining. “The allegation that politicians had influenced the decisions of the tax authorities, I can clearly reject.” At least the opposition in the Hamburg Parliament has its doubts.
The Cologne Cum-Ex investigators are also investigating why a Warburg shareholder made campaign donations of 45,500 euros to the Hamburg SPD. The Hamburg-Mitte district association of the SPD grandee Johannes Kahrs took the largest part.
Ironically, according to the public prosecutor’s investigations, the donation was made after the tax deal with the Hanseatic tax authorities had been successful. Was it a thank-you donation for tax presents worth millions?
The Warburg Bank has always rejected this. It was said that other parties were also given donations. The then chief banker Olearius also denied any political influence.
At the time, Kahrs was considered one of the most important string pullers of the SPD on the Alster as well as at the federal level. Only after a long back and forth did the former budget spokesman for his party admit to meeting with Warburg co-owner Olearius when asked in the Hamburger Abendblatt. They talked about the possible consequences of the Cum-Ex scandal.
According to the findings of the prosecutors in 2017, the topic of donations is said to have played a role in the talks. Olearius noted on September 7 that Kahrs had dropped a donor. Four days later, the first donation of 13,000 euros was made to the SPD. Further payments by the company of the Warburg owner followed.
A good 200,000 euros in cash were found in the raid by the Cologne public prosecutor’s office in the locker of former top comrade Kahrs. Rumors were already spreading that it could be consideration for lobbying in the tax affair of the Warburg shareholders. So far, however, the sum has not been confiscated because the investigators do not know the origin of the money. Nor is there a ban on keeping so much cash.
The fact is: Kahrs intervened as an influential member of the Bundestag for the private bank M.M. Warburg at the time in a number of places – for example at the Federal Office for Financial Supervision (BaFin), in the Federal Ministry of Finance as well as with Olaf Scholz – according to a diary entry of a Warburg chief banker.
At the end of October 2016, the Warburg shareholders handed Mayor Scholz a seven-page memorandum intended to prove the illegality of the tax reclaims. Scholz is said to have later recommended by telephone that this defense letter be forwarded to his finance senator Tschentscher.
This is what it says in a diary entry by the then Warburg boss Olearius. From Scholz’s point of view, however, this entry suggests that he stayed out of the tax procedure.
The SPD politician stated that he expressly did not adopt Olearius’ opinion or forward the paper himself to the responsible authority, “because this could have given rise to interpretations simply because of the fact that it was forwarded by the first mayor”.
Remarkable turnaround: after meeting Scholz, something amazing happened. The tax officer P., responsible for the Warburg tax cause, suddenly changed her mind. Three weeks before the meeting of the bankers with Olaf Scholz, the clerk had put forward a note that the Hanseatic city’s tax authorities should reclaim the 47 million euros from MM Warburg.
On November 17, 2016, eight days after the last meeting between Hamburg’s Mayor Scholz and Warburg owner Olearius, she informed the bank that the cum-ex tax payments would not be demanded after all. This happened with the placement of the executive floor in the financial authority.
Opposition politicians suspect that the change of heart is due to the influence of the then finance senator Tschentscher and his town hall chief Scholz. The SPD politicians vehemently reject the allegations. In the committee of inquiry, the head of the department also denied any political influence.
Treacherous chat traffic: However, an evaluated message from the cell phone of the tax officer P. suggests the opposite. Shortly after the positive decision for Warburg, the clerk rejoiced to a colleague that “her devilish plan” had worked.
But is this chat enough to put the tax officer on trial? Hardly likely. And what about their bosses who approved the tax gift? Why aren’t they on the list of suspects?
The Cologne public prosecutor’s office has now sent a 140-page report to the Hamburg Cum-Ex investigative committee. In it, the investigators complain that the mail accounts in the Warburg case were largely deleted. Conversely, this means that where there is no crystal-clear evidence, there is no accuser.
Should the criminal investigation ultimately come to nothing, the only thing left so far is a bitter aftertaste that suggests that the Hamburg tax authorities and politicians failed completely in the Cum-Ex affair.
