The Civil Guard suspects that Santos Cerdán had an "alternative funding source"

MadridOne year later, the long-awaited financial report from the Central Operative Unit (UCO) on Santos Cerdán has arrived. These are the Guardia Civil's conclusions: firstly, investigators have found €18,260 in cash income with an “apparently unknown origin” between 2014 and 2017, when he was a deputy in the Parliament of Navarre and Mariano Rajoy was still in Moncloa. Secondly, they have detected a “reduction in expenses” via card and cash withdrawals from 2019 onwards, in a period that “temporally coincides” with José Luis Ábalos's tenure as minister and the awarding of contracts to Acciona for the cases under suspicion. Thirdly, the settlements of advance payments from the PSOE and Congress were “higher” than the expenses they observed to be “susceptible” to claims. In total, they have analyzed €1.1 million in income and expenses from 2014 to 2025.

The document, which ARA has accessed, indicates that between 2015 and 2024 Santos Cerdán and members of his family had profits – through salaries or direct and indirect payments – of up to €323,000 that came from Servinabar, run by Antxon Alonso. His wife, Francisca Muñoz, is also under suspicion: she was hired through “a business network” in which Antxon Alonso participated, and was fired “just one day after” Koldo García's arrest. This would be the company Lorgen Genética Proteómica, from which Muñoz allegedly received €18,780 between 2023 and 2024, but in reality she would not have worked there, according to the UCO.

What happened during Ábalos's “ministerial stage”?

Card and cash payments

Throughout the 163 pages, the UCO alludes to the “ministerial stage” of José Luis Ábalos, who was part of the council of ministers from 2018 to 2021. The Civil Guard believes there are “two trends” that are “indicative” of the “possible existence of an alternative funding source” for Santos Cerdán. Firstly, it refers to card payments: “It is noteworthy that they were significantly reduced in 2019, 2020, and 2021,” the report emphasizes. In contrast, from 2022 to 2025, “an increase is observed again”.

Secondly, it discusses cash. From 2014 to 2018, Cerdán made cash withdrawals of more than 10,000 euros annually. However, from 2019 onwards, “the need to have cash from his bank accounts would have disappeared.” Withdrawals suffered a “drastic reduction” in 2019 and were “null” in 2020, 2022, and 2023. In 2021, there was a “one-off withdrawal” to pay for some works: “The recurrent need for cash observed until 2018 would have ceased in 2019 or would have been met through a source of money not originating from bank accounts,” the UCO summarizes.

78% of the cash withdrawals over twelve years occurred in the five years before Pedro Sánchez's arrival at Moncloa. And 16% were for the works in 2021. What are the two main movements that the UCO finds strange? On the one hand, 4,700 euros that he contributes to the PSOE when he was a Navarrese deputy, of which only 650 euros have a confirmed origin; and, on the other hand, 5,470 euros that he received from the PSOE in 2020, but which are not recorded in the party’s documentation.

Higher expense settlements and Servinabar

On this line, the report provides another extreme: it has observed that especially in 2020, 2021, and 2022, the expense settlements of the PSOE and Congress – the money they returned to him for having advanced it for activities related to his position – are "higher" than the expenses that the Civil Guard says he incurred, after having analyzed his payments with concepts such as "catering", "transport", or "accommodation".

They reached, for example, five times more in 2020 or twice as much in 2021. Faced with this scenario, the UCO believes there are two possibilities: Santos Cerdán claimed expenses that "were not paid by him" or "were not effectively incurred", or he paid them with an "undeclared source of funds".

Later on, it refers again to this period. The report reveals that between 2018 and 2021, the percentage of income for Servinabar from Acciona exceeded 90%, reaching 99.8% in 2020. Furthermore, it concludes that the profits from the Navarrese company for Cerdán and his family reached "maximums" between 2019 and 2023.

The 323,000 euros of his family

The UCO also provides a table that breaks down Servinabar's money from which Santos Cerdán's family benefited. There is, for example, the rent of two of his houses in Madrid: 7,200 euros from 2017 to 2018 and 52,500 euros from 2018 to 2019. Also 3,560 euros used from the company's bank card and 10,970 euros for the use of a Kia Sportage. In addition, it includes 6,000 euros for the purchase of 1,300 shares: Cerdán denies from day one that he acquired 45% of the company and the UCO, despite including it in the balance sheet, now says it has not located the payment. It also states that Servinabar negotiated the purchase of a property in Madrid for 985,000 euros for him, but that the operation was not closed due to “discrepancies in delivery times”.

Regarding his family environment, Antxon Alonso's company paid 57,700 to Santos Cerdán's brother-in-law and 23,300 euros to his sister. Likewise, payments from other companies are recorded: 139,700 euros that Erkolan paid to his sister and 9,500 euros from Noran and 18,730 euros from Loregen intended for his wife, Francisca Muñoz. Finally, regarding Servinabar's accounts, it quantifies the company's total income between 2015 and 2025 at 8.6 million, and emphasizes that they “drastically decreased” in 2025, when Cerdán and Alonso were indicted.