Posted on31 July 2009.
Reykjavik District Court today agreed to Bjorgolfur Gudmundsson’s request to be declared bankrupt.
Gudmundsson is the former billionaire head of Landsbanki and only recently gave up control of West Ham United FC.
Gudmundsson and his son, Bjorgolfur Thor Bjorgolfsson were two of the most active of the Icelandic business “outvasion Vikings”.
[...] Here is the original: Bjorgolfur bankrupt | IceNews – Daily News [...]
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How bankrupt if their companies Nova, Eimskip, Actavis, etc. are going well. Someone to explain, please.
A seminal event. Iceland has had more than its fair share of seminal events this past year…
Only Bjorgólfur senior is bankrupt, Junior is still at large, i hope this will be the last we see of this person in Iceland, he ran Hafskip in to the ground resulting in the bankruptcy of Utvegsbankinn (bank) some years ago and got suspended jail time for fraud.
then he went to Russia and is said to have made a fortune as owner of a beer factory, his rival beer producers where not as lucky, 2 CEO’s of rival factorys where murdered and one factory was burned down, of course Björgólfur and co had nothing to do with it, or the Russian mafia.
http://www.visir.is/article/20090731/FRETTIR01/796238314
The companies are just investments. So, assuming they’re worth something, they go in the asset column.
His liabilities have fallen due and need to be repaid now. The liabilities exceed these assets, otherwise he’d just transfer the shares to the creditors. He can’t borrow the money, now he doesn’t have his own personal piggy bank, so he’s bankrupt.
(Of course, he’ll have hidden a load of cash somewhere, so there’s no need to worry about him. He’ll be alright.)
A seminal event in the recent history of Iceland and we get a 3 sentence English article. Axel’s reference is somewhat better. However, I would have thought this article should have detailed what he owed and to who and what remaining assets he had at the very least. Sunlight is the best disinfectant.
“A seminal event in the recent history of Iceland and we get a 3 sentence English article”
There is so much more going on right now that no one cares about Björgólf senior, he has asked people to stop attacking his house and seems to be determined to stay in Iceland, most other bankers and fraudsters have left,
This is what people here in Iceland are interested
in right now,
http://wikileaks.org
/wiki/Financial_collapse:_Confidential_exposure_analysis_of_205_companies_each_owing_above_EUR45M_to_Icelandic_bank_Kaupthing%2C_26_Sep_2008
http://88.80.16.63/leak/kaupthing-bank-before-crash-2008.pdf
KB is trying to block this from media coverage in Iceland and has made threats to Wikileaks, which they just laughed at.
“Sunlight is the best disinfectant”
OMG, Bjorgolfur is a vampire.
To Balkanson:
>>>>How bankrupt if their companies Nova, Eimskip, Actavis, etc. are going well. Someone to explain, please.
Here is the letter (in Icelandic) Bjorgolfur himself sent to the court for his bankruptcy filing:
http://www.visir.is/assets/pdf/XZ708731.PDF
Here below are the highlights from the letter. In it he lists his assets January 1, 2008, before the crash, as follows (in ISK):
Landsbanki: 81B
Straumur: 28B
Eimskip: 16B
Icelandic: 3B
West Ham: 15B
TOTAL: 143B
Then he states that all those assets have either been reduced down close to zero or been taken over by the banks, so he has almost no personal assets left. He also states that he has taken on personal guarantees for several of the companies connected with him, which then doubled mainly due to the ISK exchange reate drop, amounting now total to about 96B ISK. At start of 2008, he further states his net worth was about 100B ISK with debt amounting to about 35% of his total assets. His salary was 16M ISK in 2008, but is now close to zero.
He lists four companies that he owned or mostly owned, that are now bankrupt:
1. Samson Group
2. Grettir investments
3. Grettir holding company
4. Olafsfell
He also mentions Hansa, which is in bankruptcy proceedings, which was the owner of West Ham United, and has now been taken over by Straumur bank.
His list of debts and guarantees is as follows:
- Debt to Landsbanki Luxembourg: 900M
- Guarantee for Samson: 22697M
- Guarantee for Rainwood: 2300M
- Guarantee for Samson Global: 19260M
- Guarantee for Grettir Invest: 21983M
- Guarantee for Grettir Holding: 27787M
- Guarantee for Olafsfell: 478M
- Other debt: 648M
TOTAL: 96053M
His list of assets are as follows:
- Bank deposits: taken up to guarantees by the banks
- Bell Global Invest: 4-6M Euros (this was stored in Landsbanki Luxembourg, which has now been closed, so he states he does not know the status of this money)
- Summerhouse in Skorradal
- Stock in foreign companies: he states those are listed on his tax return without further explanation
- Stock in domesting companies: has all been written off
He finally states his negative net worth, is now estimated to be close to 96B ISK (about 500M Euros), and he does not expect he will ever have chance to pay any of it. Therefore he request to be declared bankrupt.
To Axel and Bjarni
Thanks for the detail it is much appreciated.