The case involves billions of euros in which Banco Espírito Santo (BES) financed BESA using International Money Market (IMM) lines between at least late 2007 and the summer of 2014.
Among the indications that “it was not BES’s expectation to receive these amounts” is the fact that successive renewals of loans were detected without any formal request from BESA, explained today at the trial, the person responsible for the section on the exposure of the Portuguese bank to its Angolan subsidiary from the audit requested in 2014 by the Bank of Portugal to Deloitte.
“There is no history of payments from BESA to BES,” highlighted Vera Pita as a witness.
The financial consultant added that it was only in February 2013 that a “global limit” for IMM credit lines was established within the Portuguese bank, which, however, was not respected.
According to the person responsible, the first peak of IMM financing from BES to BESA occurred in the second half of 2008, when the Portuguese bank lent about $1.5 billion to its subsidiary in Angola for it to subscribe to Angolan Treasury bonds.
“At least 1.24 billion was effectively used [for that purpose],” stated the witness, adding that her team could not discover how $760 million later redeemed by BESA from this investment were used.
“There is no evidence that [the amount] was used to pay IMM,” she emphasized.
According to the Public Prosecutor’s accusation, on July 31, 2014, BES’s exposure to BESA was 4.783 billion euros.
Former presidents of BES, Ricardo Salgado, and of BESA, Álvaro Sobrinho, are two of the five defendants being tried in this case, which mainly focuses on the alleged misappropriation of funds between 2007 and 2012 from BES to BESA in IMM credit lines and bank overdraft.
In general, the defendants face charges of breach of trust, money laundering, and fraud, and they deny committing the crimes.
The trial has been ongoing since May 5 at the Central Criminal Court of Lisbon.
BES went bankrupt in the summer of 2014, and BESA was liquidated in October of the same year.
