Trouble at René Benko's Signa Holdings will impact its global partners, including Central Group in the region. finews.asia takes a look at the renowned family behind the Thai conglomerate. 

Last week, Julius Baer issued a statement confirming that the 70 million Swiss francs ($80 million) in provisions recorded after October 31 was related to 606 million francs of exposure to an unnamed European conglomerate. 

The conglomerate is widely believed to be real estate firm Signa Holdings, owned by Austrian businessman René Benko. Signa is considered to be one of Austria’s largest privately held real estate conglomerates and it has been rapidly expanding its portfolio in recent years, prior to its latest application for insolvency. 

It entered numerous deals with various partners worldwide and within Asia, it has been notably active with Central Group, a multinational conglomerate owned by Thailand’s renowned Chirathivat family. 

Chirathivat Family

Central Group was founded in 1947 by Tiang Chirathivat, a Chinese migrant who moved from Hainan to Bangkok in 1927. The patriarch had 26 children with three wives which resulted in 220 descendants. Together, they jointly own and manage Central Group with 51 descendants involved in a conglomerate with global businesses in retail, property development, hospitality, F&B and more.

Today, Central Group is led by grandson Tos Chirathivat as CEO and executive chairman. The Chirathivat clan is ranked as Thailand’s fourth richest family, according to Forbes, with an estimated net worth of $12.4 billion. 

Joint Deals

Benko’s relationship with the Chirathivat family began as early as 2015 when Signa sold a stake in Berlin lux department store KaDeWe to Central Group. 

The two firms would go on to co-own other assets such as Munich department store Oberpollinger, Hamburg-based premier venue Alsterhaus and Swiss lux retailer chain Globus – a deal that involved 600 million francs in credit provided by Julius Baer, according to a «SonntagsZeitung» report. 

Selfridge Group

Recently, Central Group’s co-owned portfolio with Signa began to experience changes after the latter firm showed signs of trouble.

Following the conversion of a Signa loan into equity, Central Group became the majority owner of UK department store Selfridges Group, according to filings. The two firms bought Selfridge almost two years ago for 4 billion British pounds ($5.1 billion). 

Separately, A 354 million euro ($385 million) loan from Julius Baer to Signa was switched to a short-term shareholder loan of 364 million euros, with 55 million euros due at the end of September. The filings also showed that the loan was arranged by San Simeon Investments, a British Virgin Islands company owned by Central Group.