‘Double cap ABN Amro was a risk with KLM support’ | Financial

The Court of Audit warns against this in a report on corona support to individual companies. In total there are four companies that have received support, with most of the money (3.4 billion euros) going to KLM.

In that operation, Minister Hoekstra (Finance) was advised by ABN Amro. But that bank is also part of the bank consortium that provides the billion-dollar loans to KLM. “This can lead to a conflict of interest,” warns the Court, which believes that even the appearance of such should be avoided.

The Ministry of Finance has informed the Court of Audit that a ‘procedure’ has been developed to prevent the ABN departments that sat on different sides of the negotiating table from coming into contact with each other. It is then up to ABN Amro to adhere to this, the cabinet response. The Court of Audit finds that too easy, which believes that the government itself should also actively prevent potential conflicts of interest.

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The Court of Audit also believes that the government has allowed itself to be taken in by making it public at an early stage that it wanted to provide KLM with 2 to 4 billion euros in loans and guarantees. According to the report, this has given the banks a favorable negotiating position, which means that the state now bears 93 percent of the risk of the multi-billion support for KLM. And that while the banks also have an interest in the airline’s survival, because they had already provided a lot of credit to KLM.

The Court also points out that the negotiating position did not become stronger because the support operation did not start with a detailed plan. The start was simply a conversation between KLM CEO Elbers and Ministers Hoekstra and Van Nieuwenhuizen (Infrastructure) to come up with ideas to help the airline survive the corona crisis. As a result, responsibility would have shifted to the cabinet instead of KLM. The government also disagrees with the Court of Audit’s conclusion.

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