Calisto Tanzi, in an image taken in December 2004.


© Unidad Editorial, SA
Calisto Tanzi, in an image taken in December 2004.

Former Italian businessman Calisto Tanzi, protagonist in 2003 of the largest fraudulent bankruptcy in Europe until then, that of the dairy group Parmalat, has died at the age of 83 in the Italian city of Parma (Emilia-Romagna, north), according to media reports local. Tanzi had been hospitalized in Parma since mid-December for a lung infection, not related to the coronavirus, and before he was under house arrest because he was serving a 17-year prison sentence for the Parmalat scandal, today controlled by the French group Lactalis. Born in the municipality of Collecchio, in the Emilia-Romagna region (north) on November 17, 1938, Tanzi founded at the age of 22 a dairy company that quickly became a powerful multinational, with 130 factories around the world. From being one of the best-known Italian businessmen at an international level, in 2003 he became the protagonist of the largest financial fraud in Europe, when it was discovered that he had been falsifying the company’s accounts for years and it accumulated a hole of 14,000 million euros. At the time, Parmalat employed regarding 36,000 people in 30 countries. It was declared in suspension of payments and the scandal affected more than 100,000 investors around the world who had bought bonds of the company. The businessman assured then that dozens of Italian politicians, including the three-time prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, had received funds from the company for years in exchange for favors to the company. Tanzi was sentenced to 10 years in prison for fraud in the first instance in 2008 and in 2011 the Bologna Court of Appeal sentenced him to 17 years.