Before the Bankruptcy

What Benko Wanted from His Foundations

Signa founder René Benko established several foundations with his mother.(Bild: Krone KREATIV/Krone KREATIV, Starpix/Alexander Tuma, stock.adobe.com APA/HANS KLAUS TECHT)

A few weeks before the Signa Group’s bankruptcy, billionaire bankrupt René Benko apparently focused intensely on the assets of the Benko foundations. Sensitive documents reveal his plans for million-euro grants to his family and the repayment of Signa loans.

“I still consider Benko a wealthy man—indirectly,” said Hans Peter Haselsteiner, a Signa investor and the main prosecution witness in the Innsbruck fraud trial, which on Thursday handed René Benko an additional two-year sentence—though the verdict is not yet final. In fact, in October 2023—about six weeks before the wave of insolvencies swept through the Signa Group—the financial juggler was managing the investments in the Benko foundations. This is evident from investigative documents obtained by the “Krone.”

“Shifting gold into fixed-income government bonds”
The big surprise: While the real estate speculator relied on high-risk investments at Signa, his foundations were supposed to invest much more conservatively. This was especially true of the Ingbe Foundation in Vaduz, which is considered the Benkos’ largest asset bunker. Not only do Benko’s victims, such as Haselsteiner, suspect that hundreds of millions are hidden there—funds that creditors have so far been unable to access—but investigators are also trying to crack open these bunkers.

For example, point 1 of the Word document seized from Benko states: “Reallocate gold into fixed-income government bonds.”  Point 2: “Sell the houses and landmark properties of Villa Eden Gardone (to be rented out in the meantime)—also invest in fixed-income government bonds.” In addition, the Tyrolean apparently gave thought to the Ingbe Foundation’s distributions to his children: Each child was to receive ten million euros “upon reaching the age of majority,” “for their own real estate and to get started in life.” From then on, each child was also to receive a minimum annual distribution of one million euros from the foundation’s assets. His wife was to make do with half a million. 

No Extension of the Loans
Many of these points are also reflected in the prepared “Letters of Wishes” from the founders, René and Ingeborg Benko, to the foundation’s board members. Whether these were actually signed and formally sent remains unclear. What is known, however, is that on March 11, 2025, the Ingbe Foundation sold approximately 360 kilograms of gold worth 30 million euros.

René Benko apparently already viewed the rescue of his Signa company with skepticism in October 2023. In any case, the documents related to Ingbe that were seized from him state: “No extension of loans to Signa Prime Assets (100m plus interest) and Signa Prime Selection AG (15m plus interest).” Following the “repayment by Signa Prime,” the money was to be invested “in a conservative securities strategy.”