Adidas firmly dismissed reports that it has been targeted by French investigations into the suspected laundering of money issued from tax evasion through bank accounts in Liechtenstein. A spokeswoman for the public prosecutor in Paris confirmed that it was looking into such alleged wrongdoings but that they did not concern the company itself. She said the case only referred to suspicious money transfers involving foundations and individuals related to Adidas, but their identity and the timeframe remain unclear. She said that the file would be transferred within days to an investigations unit of the customs office, in an attempt to identify the people behind the foundations.
The French investigations were triggered by a deal between the German secret services and a former employee of the LGT Bank in Liechtenstein in 2007. He supplied information about the accounts of scores of European citizens and companies, in exchange for €4.2 million and a new identity. The revelations had deep repercussions in Germany, and the French financial authorities that studied the file came to the conclusion that French entities with accounts at the LGT Bank could be guilty of tax fraud worth about €1 billion.
After the publication of a flamboyant article on the issue in Le Parisien last week, the French budget minister, Eric Woerth, confirmed that three files on suspected tax fraud had been passed on to the French judiciary because they went beyond the control of tax authorities. He refused to name the parties involved, but press reports pointed to Total, the oil company; Michelin, a French tire company; and Adidas.
Adidas stated that “neither Adidas AG nor our French subsidiary has received any inquiry from the French public prosecution authorities concerning investigations in matters of tax evasion.” Furthermore, Herbert Hainer, the Adidas group’s chief executive, said that none of the company’s entities had a bank account in Liechtenstein and he described the allegations as “absurd.”
