The Prosecutor's Office suspects that Montoro used front men to hide money.

The Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office suspects that former Finance Minister Cristóbal Montoro secretly worked in the Economic Team (EE) office, which companies paid to obtain tax benefits from the Ministry of Finance when he headed it. This is stated in a report on the case filed by a Tarragona court, to which La Vanguardia has had access. In this report, the judge highlights the evidence that the sale of his stakes in the company before coming to power under Mariano Rajoy was legal but not factual.

When he served as minister between 2011 and 2018, he was repeatedly asked about his ties to Equipo Económico, formerly known as Montoro y Asociados, which he founded with other partners after leaving José María Aznar's government. His response was always the same: that he had nothing to do with it and that he had sold his stakes in 2018, and was therefore completely unrelated to it.

At that time, the bells were already ringing, revealing the EE's ties to the Treasury, a consulting firm that acted as a lobby to secure interest rates for certain companies. As the investigation now reveals, there was already speculation that in order to obtain tax benefits through legislative reforms promoted by the Ministry, they would first have to pay the Economic Team.

The AEAT asked the judge to analyze how Montoro paid for a half-million-euro house in eight years.

Well, in 2023, the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office requested that the Central Operational Unit (UCO) investigate the former minister's accounts, suspecting that Montoro "could be using front men to secure illicit assets."

Hence, his chief of staff, Felipe Martínez Rico—brother of EE's chief executive, Ricardo Martínez Rico—omitted from the minister's CV, which was supposed to be posted on the transparency portal, information about the private activities that Montoro "could be carrying out" covertly.

The prosecutor in the case suspects that Montoro orchestrated an operation to ensure that his brother Ricardo, also linked to the Economic Team, and Ricardo Martínez Rico himself would formally acquire the minister's shares, which amounted to 30% of the shares, making him the majority shareholder. However, according to the Anti-Corruption Office, these shares were not actually transferred, based on the financial data. Among other things, there is no evidence of any capital gain from such a transaction.

The prosecutor suspects that Montoro transferred his EE shares only formally and that he would remain linked

In his opinion, the former minister, now under investigation along with top EE officials and eight former senior Treasury officials, allegedly maintained corporate status and control despite not being legally bound.

This suspicion stems from the fact that while Montoro was running the Treasury, there were contacts and ties, both family and professional, between EE and the Treasury. The judge is investigating whether five gas companies paid the consulting firm to provide the "fastest route" to Montoro and secure approval of a legislative reform aimed at achieving tax reductions.

"The transfer of the shares held by the political members of Equipo Económico was carried out at their nominal value and not at the net value of the company's assets. This aspect, coupled with the fact that the shares were transferred to certain partners and not proportionally to all, indicates that the latter could presumably manage these shares as legal but not de facto owners," emphasizes a report from the Tax Agency submitted to the investigating judge.

The Tax Agency requests clarification of the income and expenditure of money from the office abroad.

Thus, investigators are seeking the true traceability of the funds entering and leaving the US. For now, they know that the partners received their payments through companies, which were merely instrumental because they had no staff, assets, or economic activity that represented added value for Equipo Económico. Agents are analyzing the firm's income from Colombia, Panama, the US, and the UK, and, on the other hand, the outflow of foreign currency to Ireland and Luxembourg. "It is deemed necessary to access all information that may clarify the true origin and final destination of the funds," the Tax Agency states in a report included in the case.

The inspector explains, for example, that Montoro transferred part of his shares to his brother, but the official purchaser was his brother's wife. Among Montoro's accounts and bank transactions analyzed by investigators is the payment for a property worth €548,000, purchased in 2006, which he paid off in eight years, and investigators are analyzing how much he used to repay the loan. In 2016, the former minister donated €220,000 to his two daughters. He also owns five properties and an account in Luxembourg with €78,000, where he collected his pension as a member of the European Parliament.