Contrarian Corpus
short seller research note initial thesis
2022-12-14 · 39 pages

Vivion Investments S.à.r.l.

Vivion's €1.44bn bond issuer is a multi-billion euro shell game — fabricated shareholder loans, inflated occupancy and fair value gains, and related-party rents enriching controlling shareholder Amir Dayan.

N 4 Narrative
V 2 Visual
C 2 Craft
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Thesis

Muddy Waters argues that Vivion Investments S.à.r.l., a Luxembourg real-estate issuer with €1.44bn of bonds outstanding, is a multi-billion euro shell game engineered to enrich controlling shareholder Amir Dayan. The firm estimates that €304.1M of shareholder loans on Vivion's 2018 books were never actually funded, yet the company has made at least €360.1M of 'repayments' on these dubious loans to its controlling shareholders. To borrow more debt, Vivion allegedly inflates its asset base through €958.4M of fair value gains built on exaggerated occupancy — Berlin site visits suggest ~60-70% versus the ~90% claimed — and related-party rents up to double prior NOI on UK hotels. A previously undisclosed related tenant, rent24, props up the German occupancy figures, while convoluted transactions such as the 18-day RWI4 flip and the Fürst project's holding-company shuffle expose what Muddy Waters calls ample opportunity for financial leakage.

SCQA

Situation

Vivion Investments S.à.r.l. is a Luxembourg-domiciled commercial real estate company with €1.44bn of bonds outstanding, presenting itself as a solid issuer with ~90% occupancy, high-quality German office and UK hotel portfolios, and a conservative 36% net LTV.

Complication

Muddy Waters alleges the entire edifice is a shell game: €304M+ of shareholder loans appear fabricated, Berlin occupancy is closer to 60-70%, fair value gains rely on inflated related-party rents, and controlling shareholder Amir Dayan has already extracted €360M+ in loan repayments.

Resolution

Bondholders should treat Vivion's reported financials as unreliable; the report implicitly urges short positioning on Vivion's credit and heightened scrutiny of asset values, shareholder-loan repayments, occupancy claims, and related-party transactions.

Reward

Muddy Waters manages funds short Vivion's credit — the payoff is repricing of the €1.44bn bonds once the market recognizes that shareholder loans may not exist and underlying asset values are inflated.

The three reasons

  1. 1

    Up to €304M of shareholder loans likely fabricated; €360M+ already 'repaid' to Amir Dayan

  2. 2

    Berlin occupancy ~60-70%, not the ~90% Vivion claims — undisclosed related-party rent24 props up figures

  3. 3

    UK hotel fair value gains built on related-party rents double prior NOI

Primary demands

  • Investors should treat Vivion's reported financials as unreliable
  • Scrutinize existence and repayments of purported shareholder loans
  • Discount fair value gains built on related-party rents and overstated occupancy

KPIs cited

Shareholder loans potentially never funded
€304.1M of the €746.1M initial Shareholder Loans as of FY2018 appear falsified; GBP-denominated €408.6M similarly problematic
Shareholder loan repayments to controlling shareholders
At least €360.1M 'repaid' since inception through H1 2022, suggesting dividend-like extractions to Dayan-controlled entities
Berlin occupancy (claimed vs. observed)
Vivion reports ~90% in Germany; Lianeo listings imply ≥27% vacancy minimum, five-property average implied vacancy 66%, site visits estimate ~60% real third-party occupancy
Cumulative fair value gains on investment properties
€958.4M of net FV gains booked April 2018 – June 2022, supporting a larger asset base to justify more debt at claimed 36.0% net LTV
UK hotel rent inflation post-2019 spin
Related-party OpCo rents ≈£89M vs. £53.1M 2018 pre-rent NOI — ~40% inflation; Hallmark 50.3%, Ribbon 24.5%, St Martins/Sanderson ~100%
Cap rate compression via fair value gains (Hallmark)
Hallmark 2018 cap rate 4.16% pushed to 3.82% pro forma after £45.5M (17.2%) markup in 2019
Cash equity at first bond issuance
€3.1bn balance sheet but only €53M of cash equity contributed by shareholders; remaining €313M of equity from questionable non-cash FV gains

Pattern membership

Where this document fits across the library's 12 rhetorical / structural patterns.

Notable slides (5)

Notes

Text-heavy legal-memo style report (Times Roman body, blue section headings, brown/gold tables with yellow highlight accents), not a slide deck. Targets €1.44bn of outstanding bonds rather than public equity — Vivion is a privately held Luxembourg SARL. No explicit closing ask or call-to-action slide; report ends in appendix tables on p37-38. MW discloses managing funds short Vivion's credit. Controlling shareholder Amir Dayan repeatedly named; rent24 flagged as undisclosed related-party tenant ('ne'er do well WeWork imitator'). Notable shell-game visual is the corporate structure diagram on p35 detailing the Potsdamer Straße / Aroundtown / Golden Capital Partners ownership web.