Original article: Amplían querella que involucra a Sebastián Piñera Morel en presunto mecanismo de estafa y usura contra inmobiliaria
Sebastián Piñera Morel, the son of the late former president Sebastián Piñera Echenique, is the subject of a lawsuit alleging usury, stemming from the purported imposition of excessive interest rates on a loan to a real estate company.
The lawsuit was initiated in early 2024 by Inmobiliaria Los Mogotes against the individuals responsible for the Reciprocal Guarantee Society (SGR) MásAval, which provided guarantee services for small and medium-sized enterprises seeking credit access.
According to the legal documents, Los Mogotes hired MásAval (now known as Maxxa), which had ties to Piñera Morel until 2018, to secure a loan of over $1.3 billion between June and September of 2019. However, the loan was not obtained from a bank; instead, it was directly provided by two companies associated with MásAval’s partners: MA Capital and Addwise.
This situation suggests that MásAval may have violated the Reciprocal Guarantee Societies Law, which prohibits its controllers from granting loans. The lawsuit alleges that MásAval’s controllers established a parallel company to issue loans at interest rates exceeding the legal limits.
However, as reported by Interferencia, Los Mogotes has expanded its criminal complaint against MásAval. The initial accusation of usury, filed in February 2024, was broadened to include fraud on October 15, 2025, following the discovery of an alleged triangulation mechanism involving related companies to circumvent legal restrictions. The case reveals operations that left the small business with unsustainable debts after securing a $1.3 billion loan in 2019.
Core of the Accusation: Fraudulent Triangulation
The lawsuit, filed by attorney Mauricio Daza, claims that «this constitutes a genuine triangulation that conceals a business unit, profiting through fraudulent integration.»
According to the legal action, at the time the loans were granted, MA Holding SpA controlled 99.99% of MásAval.
«The remaining shares were divided between the Private Investment Fund Cabo de Hornos (0.005%) and Inversiones Almados SpA (0.005% of shares). Subsequently, Inversiones San Crescente SpA would join. Also, as part of the corporate structure of MA Holding SpA, the San Crescente company is a shareholder of BP Capital S.A., which later became a shareholder of MásAval,» reported Interferencia.
The plaintiffs argue that both SGR MásAval and MA Capital, one of the companies that provided loans to Los Mogotes, belong to the same corporate holding, whose controller and majority shareholder is MA Holding SpA.
Thus, MA Holding would be the actual controller of MásAval and the guarantor of the loans, while MA Capital would act as the lender.
According to the lawsuit, artificial fees and charges have inflated the loan costs beyond legal limits. In one contract, with a nominal value of $1,131,286,579, the real estate company only received $872,810,291, indicating a discount of over 50%.
«As such, the company I represent received significantly less money than necessary, but by the end of the term, it had to repay the full nominal capital plus all periodic interest, resulting in an obligation that is considerably greater than what was ostensibly negotiated, revealing the abusive and usurious nature of the scheme,» the lawsuit states.
It also indicated that the artificial charges totaled $258,476,288, along with the forced sale of mortgaged properties to prevent auction losses.
Connection to Sebastián Piñera Morel
Among the 17 businesspeople implicated in this operation is none other than Juan Sebastián Piñera Morel, who is a partner in MásAval through BP Capital SpA, which participates in Inversiones San Crescente, which in turn is involved in MA Holding SpA, a partner of MásAval.
The other controllers of MásAval mentioned in the lawsuit include José Tomás Lavín Burgos, legal director of the auditor Deloitte; José Miguel Bulnes Valdés and Felipe Larraín Aninat, owners of Volcom; Bernardo Simián Soza, substitute director at Aguas Andinas; Franco Acchiardo Olivos, former director of Cruzados SADP; Alejandro Poklepovic Zegers; Gonzalo Pizarro Brignardello; Lucas Marinovic Carrasco; and Cristian Rodríguez Silva.
However, when asked by Interferencia about the lawsuit expansion, the spokesperson for the businessman and son of the deceased former president stated that «Sebastián Piñera Morel did not participate in the company in question during the period referred to in the lawsuit,» and that «his exit from MA Holding SPA and the sale of all shares by Inversiones San Crescente occurred in March 2018.»
