Mega petrol
Mega-Petrol was a Bavarian oil drilling company whose collapse in 1983 caused an economic scandal.
The company was founded in 1978 by the Unterföhringen businessman Ernst Willner and the Ingolstadt textile entrepreneur Karl Schleicher as the main limited partners . The discovery and exploitation of large oil and gas fields should produce annual returns of 25%. The Bayerische Landesbank granted millions of loans and around 2000 investors invested around 270 million German marks .
The then Bavarian finance minister Max Streibl supported the company not only as chairman of the board of directors of the Landesbank, but also received payment from Mega-Petrol as an advertising medium and keynote speaker.
In fact, the lucrative dividends were not paid out of profits in the oil business but, as in a pyramid scheme, with the money of the new investors. Although the Landesbank found out about it, it continued to support Mega-Petrol with loans in the millions.
The collapse of Mega Petrol in 1983 preoccupied the judiciary for a decade. The participation of Streibl and the Landesbank made the affair a political issue. In 1993 the Landesbank was sentenced to damages to some investors for “aiding and abetting immoral damage” . Streibl (meanwhile Prime Minister ), however, remained unmolested: In 1996 the investigative committee of the Bavarian state parliament acquitted him of all allegations.
Individual evidence
- ^ A b Mathias Stamm and Renate Daum: The Bavarian oil scandal became a political issue. Graumarktinfo.de / Börse-Online, archived from the original on November 28, 2007 ; Retrieved June 5, 2008 .
- ↑ Big riddle . In: Der Spiegel . No. 50 , 1985, pp. 101-103 ( online ).