Ferrari chairman’s assets seized in tax fraud investigation

Ferrari chairman John Elkann is one of five people whose assets have been seized by an Italian judge in an ongoing investigation into alleged tax fraud by his family.

Reuters Elkann, who also serves as chairman of automotive group Stellantis, and his two siblings are accused of failing to pay taxes in Italy on assets worth nearly 75 million euros ($123 million) they inherited in 2019 following the death of their grandmother, Marella Caracciolo.

Ms Caracciolo is the wife of Fiat boss Gianni Agnelli, who built the brand founded by his grandfather into an industrial giant in the 1960s and became the parent company of Ferrari.

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According to the news outlet, there is currently a dispute between the Elkann siblings (John, Lapo and Ginevra) and their mother, Margherita Agnelli, over the death of Gianni Agnelli in 2003 and his wife Mariella in 2019.

Ms Agnelli reportedly inherited She was awarded a 1.2 billion euro ($1.97 billion) payout after the death of her father, Gianni, but only after she and her mother signed the “Geneva Agreement” to give up future influence in Dicembre, which controls the Agnelli family’s Dutch holding company Exor, where John Elkann is CEO.

The dispute stems from Ms Agnelli’s desire to rescind the agreement so that her five other children from subsequent marriages can also receive part of their grandparents’ estate, as well as Gianni Agnelli’s previously undeclared wealth, to be divided among the family.

An investigation by Turin prosecutors found that Ms. Caracciolo had been a resident of Italy, not Switzerland, since at least 2010 — meaning the inheritance should be taxed in Italy, leading to the temporary seizure of the money and assets.

according to Reutersprosecutors accused Carasiello of claiming to be living in Switzerland as “part of a criminal plan to hide her substantial assets and related income in order to evade the regulation of Italian inheritance and tax laws.”

“We reiterate that Marella Caracciolo has lived in Switzerland since the early 1970s, long before the Elkann brothers were born. She has always wanted to live in Switzerland and has never given up on that,” the siblings’ lawyers said in a statement.

Others affected by the asset seizure include Gianluca Ferrero, John Elkann’s accountant, and Urs von Grunigen, the Swiss executor of his estate.