OpenLux

Despite its assurances, the Grand Duchy remains a tax haven. Corporations, criminals, and millionaires are still setting up shell companies in Luxembourg, while Germany loses billions in tax revenues.

Unlike the Panama Papers or LuxLeaks, OpenLux does not stem from a leak of private documents. This new type of reporting is based solely on the collection of public data gradually put online by Luxembourg.

NBA great Earvin “Magic” Johnson is one of a cavalcade of the rich and famous, including golfer Tiger Woods, actors Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, and soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo, listed as owners of registered businesses in a most out-of-the-way place: the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg.

Corporate profits of $23 billion are taken out of Italy every year, resulting in tax losses of over $6.5 billion. In Europe the phenomenon costs $544 billion annually, of which $257 billion ends up in the EU’s tax havens.

Even before the first OpenLux stories were released, the Luxembourg government responded by appropriating the hashtag #OpenLux and snapping up a related web domain. The idea was to refute, in advance, the findings of the 17 media partners on the OpenLux team, to avoid repeating the missteps that followed the LuxLeaks revelations of 2014.

Transparency International analyzed OpenLux data and found that around 80 percent of private investment funds in Luxembourg did not provide ownership data. The analysis also revealed that in many cases, funds submitted conflicting information to U.S. and Luxembourg authorities.

Luxembourg has become an attractive destination for very rich Czech companies. Our database shows that 234 people (Czechs or those who have permanent residence in the country) are listed as end users or owners of Luxembourg companies. The list includes Czech oligarchs, as well as Italian real estate tycoons who have bought historic buildings in Prague and castles in the Czech countryside.

The OpenLux project can reveal that Lyubomir Konstantinov Penchev owns a real estate company in Luxembourg which has assets of BGN 1.2 million. Penchev is the son of former MP and current constitutional judge Konstantin Penchev, and the money first appeared in the company's accounts in 2014. That same year, the Penchevs bought two apartments in Sofia for a total of BGN 600,000.

What did a dancer have to do with Russia’s state oil firm buying a share in Italian tire giant Pirelli? Rosneft acquired 13 percent of Pirelli for almost 553 million euros in 2014, but as the OpenLux investigation has uncovered, the deal was not as transparent as it was made out to be.

If Luxembourg could pick its national soccer team from the pool of athletes who have established companies in the tiny nation, it would be placed far higher than 98th in FIFA’s world rankings. Those with interests in the Grand Duchy include world-class players Eden Hazard and Romelu Lukaku, the OpenLux project reveals.

If you’ve ever wondered how the Cuban economy has survived one-party rule despite 59 years under a U.S. trade embargo, secret companies hidden in a small European country offer a glimpse of how. Buried deep in the Luxembourg corporate registry was one firm that showed an owner with a familiar, well-connected name: Guillermo Faustino Rodríguez López-Calleja.

Dassault, Michelin, Sanofi ... you might stroll through Luxembourg, but not see the logo of any of these French giants. However, like most large French companies, they are discreetly located in the Grand Duchy, in the form of subsidiaries whose raison d'être is not always clear.