Tompla Business Group, a member of a cartel that manipulated the paper envelope market in Spain for 33 years, from the first democratic elections until 2010, has made million-dollar provisions in its 2023 accounts after several judicial convictions estimating claims from its clients for the damages suffered with these illegal agreements. The two main parties, PSOE and PP, have already achieved rulings partially upholding their demands.
In its consolidated accounts for 2023, the company that brings together the group’s businesses, Grupo Empresarial Tompla (which until August was called Printeos), explains that “the administrators and legal advisors have considered it necessary to record a provision as of December 31, 2023 for an amount of 14,061 thousand euros, sufficient to cover the risk derived from past events.” This figure multiplies the provisions of 3.54 million that the company had provided until now after receiving various convictions resulting from lawsuits from some clients.
In its accounts, accessible through Insight View, Tompla explains that after the year ended in December 2023 and before formulating its accounts on March 27, it has made “a provisional allocation” of 11,141 million “associated with the estimated risks as of December 31, 2023.”
Deloitte’s audit report states that this last provision is “related to a client claim, for which there is a conviction.” The firm, which has audited Tompla for more than 20 years, has placed a qualification in the 2023 accounts (there are several) due to the way in which the company has accounted for that provision. The company has charged it against the financial result, and not in the “Other results” heading of the profit and loss account, as required by accounting regulations.
Claims for this matter are piling up for Tompla. In its latest accounts, it indicates that during the 2023 financial year alone “it has received five other similar demands from clients for alleged damages” suffered as a result of that cartel. In his opinion and that of his legal advisors, the claims “are statute-barred.” It states that there is jurisprudence on the matter from the Supreme Court and the Court of Justice of the EU. “Although it is possible that some of these lawsuits succeed, it is unlikely that they will be fully considered” and that “they will represent a financial loss,” he assures.
The first ruling that upheld the lawsuit of a political party against Tompla was the one that in March 2021 condemned the company to compensate the PSOE for the damages suffered as a result of the surcharges paid in those years. The socialists estimated the damage suffered (adding interest) at more than 8 million in their lawsuit, presented in June 2019.
Subsequently, the Provincial Court of Barcelona forced the subsidies received for the acquisition of these envelopes to be deducted from the calculation. The PSOE and Tompla have brought the dispute before the Civil Chamber of the Supreme Court. The High Court admitted them to proceedings on September 25.
After the PSOE’s lawsuit against Tompla, the PP and IU (also including the PCE, among other formations) joined the judicial battle. And it has worked for the popular ones. In November 2023, the Commercial Court 11 of Barcelona partially upheld the lawsuit filed in July 2022 by the party chaired by Alberto Núñez Feijóo, which, based on the previous claim raised by the PSOE, requested compensation of 10,602,701, 21 euros.
The joint demand presented by IU, the PCE and other small leftist groups has had less luck. Their lawsuit was dismissed last February by the Barcelona Commercial Court due to “lack of standing,” given that “either none of the plaintiffs appeared directly, or they appeared in coalition with others.” In this case, the claim they were requesting was 9,176,663.79 euros as of the date of the lawsuit.
Sales of 302 million
The Tompla holding company had a turnover of 302 million in 2023, 8.7% more, according to its latest accounts. “This increase is largely explained by the two electoral processes (municipal and regional elections and general elections) that have occurred in Spain in 2023,” he explains in his management report.
With an operating result of 20.1 million and a gross operating profit (Ebitda) of 33.3 million, 22% more, the group’s consolidated result was 3.8 million, compared to 10.5 million in 2022 .
The company was born in 1961 as a manufacturer of special envelopes for the then incipient mail order. It was called Manufacturas Tompla until October 2012, when the CNC was already completing its investigation, the parent company of the group’s businesses changed its name to Printeos, a name that it abandoned last summer to regain its original name.
Tompla is based in Alcalá de Henares (Madrid) and in 2023 it employed 1,647 people. The company began its international activity in the 70s and currently more than 63% of its income comes from outside Spain. It operates in 12 European countries, with ten commercial offices and 29 production centers in Spain, France, Portugal, the United Kingdom, Poland, the Czech Republic and Morocco.
In 1992 it opened its factory in Alcalá, from which more than 50,000 orders are managed annually and which became the largest envelope factory in the world. Since 2014, and faced with the decline of the paper envelope business, it has focused on the self-adhesive label sector through acquisitions in several countries. In 2023 this activity exceeded half of the business.
Since this year, the holding company has a new president, Antonio Borrachero Bonilla, whose family has historically been linked to the shareholders of this company and the insurance or football business. Borrachero is the brother of the well-known actress Alicia Borrachero and grandson of Antonio Borrachero Casas, who was a director during the Franco regime of the insurance company Plus Ultra and president of the club of the same name, the seed of the Real Madrid subsidiary. Tompla has declined to comment.
The CNC resolution indicated that the cartel’s validity for more than 30 years in the national envelope market “probably contributed to leaving the Spanish market outside of the sectoral concentration processes that have occurred in Europe since the beginning of the year 2000, provoked by the excess supply and the search for greater efficiencies and economies of scale in production.” While five large groups were created in Europe in those years, in Spain there were still 15 manufacturers still surviving at the time.
When dismantling this cartel in 2013, the CNC imposed sanctions of more than 44 million on 15 companies. The largest fine (more than 20 million) was for Unipapel (later Adveo), which was liquidated in 2019 and was freed from paying for having reported the facts by taking advantage of the so-called Leniency Program, which grants exemptions to participants in anti-competitive practices who collaborate. in the files.
Another company, Antalis, was given a 40% discount on the amount of the fine. A reduction in the amount of the penalty of 30% was applied to Tompla, Hispapel, Pacsa, Maespa and SAM (from Tompla). The actions of Copidata, who was also involved in the plot, were archived as the statute of limitations had expired.
After the Supreme Court confirmed the sanctions at the end of 2017, many affected parties, and not just political parties, went to court to seek compensation. Among others, Bankoa (now Abanca), the NGO Manos Unidas (which have already achieved firm resolutions in the Supreme Court), and others such as Cortefiel (today Tendam), Venca, Grupo Planeta, Mutua Madrileña, Caixa Ontinyent, Misiones Salesianas, Obras Pontifical Missionaries, Madrid Chamber of Commerce or Ifema.
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