At the end of December, Dorothea Hotel Szállodaüzemeltető Plc. went through significant capital restructuring: all that’s visible on the surface is a 10-million raise of the firm’s share capital, while in reality, an operation worth nearly 1.5 billion HUF took place – as per the company records. Beyond the 10 million forints appearing in the share capital increase, 1.47 billion forints were allocated to the capital reserves. (This was a so-called premium capital increase, where the issue value of the newly issued shares exceeds their nominal value.)
The company’s ownership structure is interesting: the majority share package belongs to the central company of István Tiborcz’s real estate empire, BDPST Plc., while the minority stake is the property of a trust company whose sole owner is one of the mysterious private equity funds. We recently reported BPST to be a veritable money printing machine: between 2019 and 2023, the firm produced 48.4 billion forints in profit, from which 5.5 billion forints were withdrawn as dividends – while not a single forint of corporate tax was paid into the budget. This was made possible by taking maximum advantage of transferrable tax benefits related to monument renovations within the real estate group, essentially reducing corporate tax to zero in recent years.
The minority share package is owned by fund manager MLKSPV Ltd., a subsidiary of Főnix Private Equity Fund. The ownership structure of private equity funds – also referred to as the “Hungarian offshore” – is a closely guarded secret, inaccessible to the public. Főnix is linked to István Tiborcz on the basis that its managing company is Gránit Fund Management Plc., a corporation associated with the Prime Minister’s interests.
