Leonhard Dobusch

"But why did Benko make such unusual, legally borderline promises to his financiers that he would buy back their shares? And at the increased price due to the appreciation of the properties, not at the lower entry price? The answer is simple: Without the so-called put options he offered, Benko would have found much fewer investors. Roland Berger, at any rate, today answers the question of whether he would have given Benko money without a contractual exit clause with a clear and succinct no. The business economist and early warning signal, Professor Leonhard Dobusch from Innsbruck, says: "I believe the investors knew exactly how risky the business was and that it was a bubble. But they thought they could get out in time. For this, Benko gave them the put options.""

"Innsbruck business administration professor Leonhard Dobusch and his colleague Jakob Sturn see in capital raising "one of the central innovations of the Signa model" and describe the approach in an article in the Austrian journal Juridicum. Under the headline "Listen to the Signa (ls)", they summarize in their manuscript: "The exit only works, of course, if not all shareholders exit at the same time (...) At the same time, however, this financing model relied to a certain extent on avoiding transparency. Not all investors were offered put options, and the conditions for the put options remained secret. This was probably also to prevent 'contagion' or 'herd effects' should individual investors exercise their put options, and to conceal unequal treatment of investors.""