Judicial proceedings could void the Santander Administration

President, Ana Patricia Botin, Vice President Rodrigo Echenique, counselors Javier Botín, Ignacio Benjumea, Sol Daurella and Juan Miguel Villar Mir are related to various legal proceedings that reveal their unsuitability for managing a financial institution

Standards and guidelines for financial and listed companies (Articles 24 et seq Law 10/2014;. Articles 29 et seq RD 84/2015, guidelines for the assessment of the adequacy of the European Central Bank and the European Banking Authority. unified code of good governance of listed companies of the CNMV, etc.) require their managers  commercial and professional ; establish the responsibility of the supervised institutions to appoint members who meet the eligibility requirements and establish evaluation criteria among which is  the reputation, conflict of interest and collective fitness. In the event that the board members do not meet the requirements of respectability establish the obligation of society to communicate to the supervisory bodies and remove the administrator 'inidóneo "if he does not resign voluntarily.

The  guide ECB  maintains that  criminal, administrative judicial proceedings, both completed and pending, can have an impact on the reputation of the affected management and supervised entity and that the mere fact that a director is, or has been , incurso in such proceedings it is relevant to their honor . Guide ECB attaches great importance to the circumstances that gave rise to the proceedings to be relevant to determine whether they affect reputation management even when the decision is favorable, but it is based on procedural issues rather than facts showing not committed the alleged act.

The Board of Directors of Santander is littered with directors who are being or have been investigated for allegedly committing various crimes, which calls into question his honesty and therefore their suitability to hold office in the management of a financial institution . So much so that at the last meeting of the minority shareholder and Santander Investment Home lawyer, Eduardo Martín Duarte, calledthe removal ofentire board of directors, in some cases per share and other default of its members.

Let the charges that fall on the various members of the board of directors that would demonstrate a "unsuitability" collective evident as six of the fifteen being directly involved in legal proceedings to examine.

We start by its president  Ana Patricia Botin  who was  indicted by the Audiencia Nacional for tax fraud that came to light with the Falciani list . In that criminal proceedings it will be imputed to the president of Santander and other members of his family have hidden 2,000 million euros in the HSBC Switzerland to the Treasury for 70 years. The president acknowledged hiding the money and not pay the corresponding taxes , Botin family being forced to regularize the last five years not prescribed paying 200 million euros. The payment of this amount served to not be convicted of tax fraud by applying a mere absolving excuse. Ana Patricia Botin has also been punctuated by the scandal of the Ponzi scheme  Bernard Madoff  65,000 million, which was implicated her husband  Guillermo Morenés  and his brother Javier Botín through its boutique private banking  Morenés & Loot Capital Advisers . The scammer Bernard Madoff has had visits he made Ana Patricia Botin and her husband in his office in the Lipstick Building in New York and made him the invitation to witness with them America 's Cup in Valencia aboard his boat. Santander sold approximately 3,000 million euros, through its subsidiary  Optimal Investment Services  based in the Swiss city of Geneva and responsible Manuel Echevarría , CEO of Optimal, who escaped a criminal conviction in Switzerland for the case Madoff because the main witness,  Rajiv Jaitly , head of risk control of the Swiss manager of Santander Optimal July 2005 to December 2007, finally  he did not testify  at the trial  after having said earlier in July 2012 to the American authorities in 2006 had warned unsuccessfully to Santander in a report of 50 pages of gross deficiencies of the products and the impossibility of verifying the commercial operation of Madoff .

The recent case of  Banco Popular , which our colleague Esteban Cano takes several months to report on time is directly related to the president of Santander to occur during his tenure and speak to the gossip of the financial world of alleged insider trading and scheming.

Similarly, the case of alleged embezzlement of 50 million euros to shareholders of Santander in the case of the estate of Mijas ,which we reported in Diario16 and for which he was asked at the recent Board, also splashes Ms. Botin because it was a member of the executive committee authorized the sale of the estate of 480,000 m 2  by 450,000 euros when their value exceed, according to different valuations, the 50 million euros. Till the date,Ana Patricia Botin has not taken any action for the defrauded amount is returned to the bank and its shareholders. This process also could be involved Rodrigo Echenique, Ignacio Benjumea Cabeza de Vaca and Javier Botín who, in the year 2,007 he was told by a notary, in his capacity as advisor, without which has since been carried out any action for restitution to bank allegedly defrauded amount.

The same accusations could be attributable to his brother Javier Botín and he also participated in hiding the Spanish Treasury 2,000 million euros in the HSBC Switzerland . Javier Botín was related to the Madoff scandal through M & B Capital Advisors that toxic products marketed Madoff and caused an alleged loss carry its customers approximately 152 million euros.In addition, Javier Botín, director of Santander for being president of the Botín Foundation and on behalf of the syndication of shares formed with the shares of the Botin family, called the alleged fraud estate Mijas since the year 2,007 was told notary in his capacity as advisor without since then has carried out any action for restitution to the bank allegedly defrauded amount.

As vice president, Rodrigo Echenique Gordillo , he was on his imputed day by the High Court in the case of loan transfers , in which, with Emilio Botin and Ignacio Ucles, he was accused of tax fraud and forgery to have defrauded about 80 million euros to the Spanish Treasury and having provided false documentation. Echenique escaped condemnation, not substance, but by the controversial "Botin doctrine" that had five individual votes against the same judges of the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court. Echeniquealso it was punctuated by the Madoff scandal that apparently was visiting to withdraw funds from Santander invested in their toxic products. Echenique is executive vice president of Santander and could have direct knowledge of the intricacies of the operation of the Popular Bank, which is its current president and that during the operation that ended with the intervention of the sixth financial institution in the country, dispatched with Emilio Saracho in the passenger compartment of your car , as Esteban Cano has been confirmed through several sources familiar with this fact.

Similarly, Echenique was accused by the Anti - Corruption Prosecutor for tax fraud, along with the other members of the Executive Committee of Santander, in the case of delivery of 1% of the shares of Banesto to Alfredo Sáenz and other commissioned by the Bank of Spain following the intervention of the entity, which would subsequently appointed managers. In that case more than 6 million shares of Banesto to € 2.40 (400Ptas) surrendered when its market value was € 5.09, more than double.

Councilor Ignacio Benjumea Cabeza de Vaca, former secretary general of the bank, is being investigated today by the National Court for the alleged commission of an offense of money laundering related to the Botin family heritage at HSBC in Switzerland. Ignacio Benjumea, as general secretary of Santander and secretary of the board of directors, the executive committee and all committees of the bank and head of the legal department of the bank for nearly 20 years, was responsible for advising on the legality of the resolutions adopted by all those bodies so it could have responsibility for the unlawfulness thereof.

The Minister Sol Daurella Comadrán, president of Coca Cola European Partners and Cobega, bottler of Coca Cola (holding company with a higher annual income to 4,000 million euros) , it is accused in a case of crime of unfair administration and against the rights of workers, the opening of the trial has been recently agreed by the Provincial Court of Zaragoza. The complaint relates to the purchase of Cacaolat and promise to the bankruptcy administrators and workers in new investments, maintaining production and employment promises were not fulfilled and culminated in the closure of its Zaragoza factory and allegedly fraudulent dismissal from the workers.

Finally , we counselor Juan Miguel Villar Mir, former Minister of Finance and Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs, to which it is related to the illegal funding of PP and alleged bribes in Mexico and Algeria . He isaccused by the High Court in the Punic plot by prevarication, embezzlement, fraud, bribery, criminal organization, money laundering, falsification of commercial documents and influence peddling, as in the case Lezo. In addition, your company OHL has been reported in Mexico for allegedly funding the PRI and public works commissions multimillion by its president José Andrés de Oteyza had to resign.In May 2017 complaint was filed with the National Electoral Institute of Mexico with multiple charges against Juan Miguel Villar Mir. In the complaint mention it is made innumerable recordings of directors of OHL in which there is talk of bribery of judges, how to avoid complying with court judgments and government favors to pressure judges to benefit OHL; false accounting, etc.

In conclusion, we have a board with six directors directly related to lawsuits whose suitability is questionable; while the remaining members of the board, but are not related to processes, they know and do not carry out any action for the return of money allegedly defrauded.

source: diario16