The Madrid Provincial Prosecutor's Office has requested four years and nine months in prison for Carlo Ancelotti, coach of Real Madrid, for having defrauded the treasury of 1,062,079 euros in the fiscal years of 2014 (386,361 euros) and 2015 (675,718 euros).
The public ministry charges him with two crimes against the Treasury, since, despite the fact that he himself affirmed his status as a resident in Spain for tax purposes and that he reflected that his address was in Madrid, he only recorded the remunerations in his income tax returns. of personal work received from Real Madrid.
He thus omitted the performance corresponding to the exploitation of his image rights that he had transferred to other entities.
The indictment maintains that Ancelotti signed an employment contract as coach of Real Madrid on July 4, 2013 for the period between July 5, 2013 and June 30, 2016, “specifying his remuneration for that period, In addition to work income, income derived from the transfer of image rights to the club.”
Furthermore, it specifies that since July 2013 the accused began to work and reside in Spain, establishing as his domicile and habitual residence a property located in a central square in Madrid.
However, when the coach ended his relationship with Real Madrid “early” on May 25, 2015, he had the home rented until October of that year, so during 2015 “Spain was his main center of personal and personal relationships.” Economic interests".
During his time in court, in July 2021, Ancelotti acknowledged before Judge Inmaculada Lova Ruiz that he did not correctly pay taxes for the 2014 financial year, but attributed this irregularity to poor advice.
In fact, to correct the error, the white team's coach offered to pay the amount close to 300,000 euros that he is accused of having defrauded that year.
However, Ancelotti did not make the same statement in relation to 2015, the year in which he was dismissed as coach of Real Madrid.
In this sense, the now accused defended that he did not spend in Spain 183 days - the minimum time established to consider a person resident in national territory - but 158 days, something that he assured that he could prove.
Legal sources consulted by EL PAÍS point out that this second exercise may be the most controversial in the trial, since it was archived during the investigation, but was reopened after the Prosecutor's Office appealed.
Transfer of image rights
In its indictment, the public ministry emphasizes that “in order to avoid taxation on the income from said image rights” both those received by Real Madrid and other brands for various events, the coach went to a “complex ” and “confusing” network of trusts and companies filed to channel the collection of image rights.
Thus, it "simulated" the transfer of its image rights to entities "lacking real activity" and exploitation capacity that were domiciled outside of Spain, "thus pursuing opacity in the face of the Spanish public treasury and the concealment of the real beneficiary of the income from his image rights, so that neither he himself nor any of said companies would have to pay taxes on the large amounts received in Spain or outside our country."
Ancelotti, according to the Prosecutor's Office, signed a private contract on July 1, 2013 in which he transferred his image rights to the entity Vapia Limited for a period of ten years and a price of 25,000,000 euros.
A day later, the entity names the Real Madrid coach as his representative, “granting him maximum powers to manage his image rights.”
Later, on an unspecified date, an annex to the agreement was formalized that modified the duration of the agreement, reducing it to three years and the purchase price of the image rights lowering it to one million euros.
On July 4, 2013, “parallel” to his signing as coach of Real Madrid, the accused was granted a private contract with the club in which he transferred 50% of his image rights to the sports entity between 5 July 2013 and June 30, 2016. The other 50% was held by an “unnamed” and “undetermined” company that acted in the name and representation of the Italian coach.
This company turned out to be Vapia LLP, domiciled in London, and not Vapia Limited, a company incorporated in the Virgin Islands, a circumstance that was not communicated to Real Madrid until a year later.
"In this way, the accused used the company Vapia LLP so that it formally presented itself to Real Madrid as the owner of the image rights, despite the fact that it had not even been formally attributed them, since the aforementioned transfer contract of July 1, 2013 was with Vapia Limited,” the letter adds.
Ancelotti, according to the Prosecutor's Office, submitted his self-assessment declarations corresponding to personal income tax on time, in which he affirmed his status as a resident in Spain and where his address was a property located in a central square in Madrid, he only stated the personal work remuneration received from Real Madrid.
However, "it omitted all income corresponding to the exploitation of its image rights (...) thus arriving at declarations with negative quotas" with a negative balance of 39,575 euros in the fiscal year of 2014 and 529,076 in 2015, amounts that They were returned by the Tax Agency in both cases.
The Prosecutor's Office specifies that the income derived from the transfer of image rights represented income amounting to 1,249,590 euros in 2014 and 2,959,768 in 2015 without Ancelotti or the other two entities having paid taxes on these amounts.
But in addition, the technician also omitted in his statements the ownership of two real estate properties located abroad.
After carrying out the corresponding adjustments, the Spanish Treasury calculated the loss suffered based on omitted rents and income and refunds obtained at 1,062,079 euros (386,361 in fiscal year 2014 and 675,718 in fiscal year 2015).
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