MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

The Kirchner couple fortune soared 158% last year: totals 12.1 million US dollars

The ruling couple have proved to be excellent investors in Patagonia real estate

The fortune of Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner and her husband and former president Nestor Kirchner soared 158% in 2008 having reached the equivalent of 12.1 million US dollars according to sworn statements from the couple published Tuesday in the Buenos Aires press.

The net increase in the couple’s assets is born, among other reasons, from the sale in 3.8 million US dollars of 16 real estate assets in the province of Santa Cruz, their political turf.

During 2008 the Kirchners bank deposits trebled reaching 8.4 million US dollars, according to the personal assets statement presented at the beginning of the month to the Anticorruption Office and which were reproduced by the Buenos Aires press.

According to the document the Kirchners own 28 real estate properties valued at 3.8 million US dollars; four companies worth 4.8 million US dollars and bank deposits totalling 8.4 million US dollars. They are creditors of 99.220 US dollars and have pending loans for five million US dollars.

Last year the presidential couple crated two companies to expand their hotel business in El Calafate, Patagonia, next to the National Glaciers Park, one of the main attractions of southern Argentina and where the couple already has a residence and a boutique hotel.

In January 2008, the Kirchners sold a piece of land, 20.000 square metres, in 1.65 million US dollars, which they had purchased two years before from the provincial government in 34.750 US dollars, reports the Buenos Aires press.

For over a year now a claim has been filed against Mr. Kirchner for alleged illicit actions on purchasing provincial government land in El Calafate, at rock bottom price. The action was initiated by a local attorney but the prosecutor in the case is a niece of the Kirchners, Natalia Mercado.

Alvaro De Lamadrid has publicly complained that the case remains paralyzed in the prosecutor’s office.

The Argentina press also points out that the fortune of the Kirchners has multiplied by six since Mr. Kirchner took office in 2003. At that time their personal assets statement totalled 1.8 million US dollars.