The cards are armored in a 361-foot, 110-meter skyscraper of justice in the heart of Miami, deep Florida, a stone's throw from the Bahamas, on the opposite side of the Havana coast. Here, in the US state farthest from Washington and closest to Cuba, one of the key games of one of the most controversial financial and political intrigues in the history of the Italian navy and beyond is being played.

The vacuum package

On January 14th, a vacuum packet climbed the upper floors of the United States Court of Justice, South Florida district. To convey it is Juan Pablo Morillo, a lawyer of the house in the courthouse that stands on the longest avenue in Miami. His mandate, complete with an Italian proxy, is signed at the bottom by one of the offspring of the Moby family. The acronym is that of Achille Onorato, one of the two sons of Vincenzo, the patron of Mascalzone Latino, owner of Moby and of the Italian Navigation Company, Cin. Nobody knows anything about this Sardinian dossier, transport and business, which landed on the coast of Miami Beach. Judicial secrets, to be kept under wraps so as not to alert the markets. In reality, the goal is all too clear: to narcotize the American owners of the shares of the 300 million euro bond, issued on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange. A sea of money, all to be repaid, which allowed Onorato to buy, but not pay, the old Tirrenia from the Italian state, together with the routes to and from Sardinia.

Last chance

The synthesis of the operation carried out in the shade of Miami's palm trees is called “last resort”. The goal is clear: to prevent American bondholders from having a heavy impact on the rescue operation of the two companies, given that the Milan prosecutor, after having asked Cin for bankruptcy, forwarderi also asked for that of Moby. Two obstacles stand in the way of the attempt to avoid the final showdown: the American “shareholders” of the bond and the Tirrenia commissioners in extraordinary administration. The first game, therefore, is played in the heart of Florida, in Miami, elected as the Court of Justice holder of the "Chapter 15" procedure, chapter 15, of the United States Bankruptcy Code. Onorato has decided to climb at every crack to avoid the worst, namely the bankruptcy of his shipping companies. The deployment in Miami is a war without borders. The lawyers on the field are a crowd. The first papers of the dossier that speaks American are all dedicated to the establishment of Onorato's defensive pool: from Patricia Tomasco of Texas to Nicoletta Malagioglio of California, from Alain Jaquet of the district of New York to Joanna Diana Cayatas also of the Court of the Big Apple. It is they who will have to support in Miami the correctness of the Italian bankruptcy procedure and ask the United States to prevent any American interference in the conduct of the pre-bankruptcy phases that concern both Cin and Moby. With the "Chapter 15" of the bankruptcy justice of the States, in fact, access to the courts of the United States is allowed, subject to authorization, for "cross-border cases". A rule invoked by Onorato's lawyers to try to stem the American impetus in the bankruptcy procedure initiated by the Court of Milan.

Devils and vultures

The owner of Mascalzone Latino fears the American holders of an avalanche of Luxembourg bonds like the devil. He knows perfectly well that they are waiting for nothing more to reject without appeal that plan that re-launches the return of that money in the Greek Kalends. Speculative funds it is clear, most of the times described with the harshest appellation of "vultures", but still holders of a right. In the papers "secreted" in the American vaults, and in our possession, there are the reasons, according to Onorato, why the justice of the United States blocks any assault on the Italian bankruptcy procedure. The lawyers, accustomed to US bankruptcy law, advised Onorato to ask the Miami Court for the adoption of a deed ordering the suspension of any pending action, effectively blocking the operations of US bondholders. The documents kept secret in the building are teeming with explicit requests.

The secret dossier

The first document in our hands, written by the lawyers, is clear: «The foreign representative (Onorato ed) initiates this chapter 15 procedure for two main reasons. The first is to obtain from this Court the recognition of the Italian "Insolvency Procedure" as the main foreign procedure ". The second is the most direct one, all aimed at those who have asked the United States for Onorato's bankruptcy. Moby's lawyers write: "In order to allow a quick and effective commercial restructuring in the Italian insolvency procedure, including the execution of all rights and obligations under the contract and other agreements, Moby is now asking for the protections provided for by the Chapter 15 ". The heart of the instance is all in the chapter of American creditors, those to be blocked at any cost to prevent them from causing the bankruptcy of Cin and Moby. The appeal of the lawyers hired by Onorato in the States becomes stringent: «Despite the progress of discussions with creditors, some have continued to threaten the business continuity of the Moby Group. Thus, on 30 June 2020, Moby and its main subsidiary Compagnia Italiana di Navigazione SpA presented two separate requests for judicial restructuring. Consequently, starting from 1 July 2020, any deeds of Moby and CIN, starting with creditors and continuing with the enforcement procedures and foreclosures on the assets of Moby and CIN have been automatically "suspended". This "suspension" will remain in force as long as the respective insolvency proceedings are pending on Moby and CIN ».

Stop the Americans

Onorato now demands that American justice extend this "suspension" to his American enemies as well. If the Miami Court, it is written in the documents, will not grant this extension of the Italian suspension also on American territory there is "the probability of irreparable damage". The red thread between Miami and the Roman palaces, however, is still hidden. From the shores of Miami to the Palazzo del ventennio, however, the step is short. The other key move of the Tirrenia-Moby affair takes place in the heart of what was once the "good life" of Rome, on the slopes of Via Veneto, seat of the Ministry of Economic Development. If in Florida it is Honored to turn to the Judges, in Italy it is the Prosecutors who investigate the owner of Mascalzone Latino and his relations with politics. The money passed from the accounts of the shipping company, first to Renzi's foundation and then to Grillo's blog and to the Casaleggio company, turned the spotlight on precisely the work of that Roman building that deals with Tirrenia in extraordinary administration.

Under observation

There are two crucial points of the "attention" that the investigators could turn to the work of the Conte 2 government. Under observation there are some steps taken by the then Ministers of Economic Development, Stefano Patuanelli, five stars and infrastructure Paola De Micheli, of the Democratic Party . The magistrates' lens is directed, above all, to the messages that Patuanelli would have received from Grillo to "save" Onorato in the crucial phase of the seizure of bank accounts by the Court of Rome. It is there that one of the most controversial passages of the whole story takes place. It is March 4, 2020 when the Roman judges order the seizure of 55 million euros from the accounts of Cin, the was Tirrenia, purchased but not paid by Onorato. With the seizure of bank accounts requested by the extraordinary commissioners of Tirrenia Onorato, he threatens the blocking of ships and public service to and from Sardinia. It is at that point that the two ministers intervene to ask the commissioners to move the seizure from the bank accounts to the ships. Honored, with that decision, will be able to continue to manage the cashier in exchange for a useless conservation seizure of the ships, given that he will continue to use them.

Nothing in the state

The state, on the other hand, will have to settle for nothing, since those ships are already abundantly burdened by mortgages of various degrees. A real gift, with a justification from the government that is really not very credible such as that of the risk of interruption of a public service. In those same hours, in fact, another shipowner formally communicated to the Ministry of Transport his immediate availability to perform that service in place of the company subjected to seizure. The two ministers, however, ignore the offer and give the order: move the seizure to the ships, leave them in operation in favor of the same shipowner and release the money in the bank accounts. All elements, obligatorily, to be examined by the magistrates of Milan.

Imaginative promises

Now the key to the problem returns, however, in the hands of the building in Via Veneto. To be decided, in a short time, is the acceptance or not of the composition plan presented by Onorato to save the companies. The Ministry of Development is called upon to decide whether or not to accept a reduction of 180 million euros and above all whether to wait until 2025 to have any hope of recovering them. The department of Via Veneto must, therefore, decide whether to grant a further extension to Onorato who, since the purchase of Tirrenia, from 2012 to today, has not yet paid a single euro of those 180 million euro that it still owes to the state.

Finished gifts and competition

It would be an act of heavy "trust", given the investigations opened in Milan and Florence. And, above all, because that concordat plan is based on two decisive "limits": the lack of those 72 million euros per year of territorial continuity from and to Sardinia and two competitors, Grimaldi and Aponte, not at all willing to make concessions to Onorato. The future of the two companies, which have always been monopolists in the Sardinian sea, therefore passes from the “Bella Vita” of Rome to that of Miami. And it won't be a vacation.

Mauro Pili

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