Indigo Finans investments

Retail investors who invested money into retail estate projects managed by Indigo Finanslost millions, following the bankruptcy of the firm. The company at the centre of the scandal set up a complicated structure that allowed it to sell on commercial properties at highly inflated valuations to retail investors. However, the Financial Supervision Act mandates that the kind of financial ’services’ that Indigo Finansprovided requires a permission from the Norwegian financial supervisor. Yet the company had never applied for such permission with the supervisor.

In early 2017, the authority warned Indigo Finansthat it considered ordering the company to stop its illegal operations. After Indigo Finansbusiness dealings were reported in Kapital, a Norwegian financial magazine, the financial authority issued a public warning to investors about Indigo Finansin May 2017. The company declared bankruptcy in December 2017 after being sued by a large number of disgruntled investors.

 

In one of several examples, a holding company of Indigo Finansacquired one commercial property for roughly worth €4 million. Indigo Finansthen facilitated the sale of the property to retail investors with an inflated valuation of more than €6 million. According to an estimate by Kapitala profit of roughly €2 million was pocketed by the holding company. From 2014 to 2016, the holding company netted a total profit of almost €7 million from an initial investment of less than €3,500.