Emails from German Chancellor Olaf Scholz have been scrutinized as part of an investigation into the “CumEx Files” scandal, a dividend tax fraud, the Hamburger Abendblatt daily reported on Monday.
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Investigators examined emails in March beginning on January 1, 2015, when Olaf Scholz was mayor of Hamburg (north), a position he retained until his appointment in 2018 as finance minister in the former government. Chancellor Angela Merkel.
The CumEx scandal, a fraud first revealed in 2017, concerns an ingenious tax optimization scheme put in place by banks and allowing foreign investors to reduce their taxes on dividends.
Dozens of people have been charged in the case in Germany, including bankers, brokers, lawyers and financial advisers. A total of ten countries are concerned.
Among the banks in question was the Warburg in Hamburg, which should have reimbursed 47 million euros to the German port city, but the municipality had waived it in 2016.
Investigators are trying to find out if political leaders – and among them Olaf Scholz, then mayor of the city – pressured the municipal tax authorities to stop collecting these taxes.
Mr. Scholz is to be questioned again on Friday in Hamburg by a parliamentary committee on his role in this affair.
His spokesman, Steffen Hebestreit, told the Hamburger Abendblatt that the chancellor was not aware of the investigation into his emails and that “there is nothing else to hide”.
The decision to waive reimbursement of amounts owed by the Warburg bank was reportedly taken shortly after a conversation between then-mayor Olaf Scholz and Christian Olearius, then head of the bank, according to the German press.
Mr. Scholz, however, denies having pressured the tax authorities of the city of Hamburg to give up collecting these taxes.