Orbán’s former spin doctor registers address at northern Italian villa

Árpád Habony, a former strategic adviser to Viktor Orbán and a key figure in Hungary’s pro-government business and media network, has changed his Budapest address to that of a villa in Varese, northern Italy, according to Hungarian company records reviewed by Atlatszo. In the same city, other members of the circle close to Orbán purchased a luxury property worth several million euros.

The change, effective from July 30, appears in several companies linked to Habony, including LVC Diamond, the operating company of a casino group he co-owns with businessman István Garancsi. Habony’s 33 percent stake has not changed. The group operates five Budapest casinos and the Vegas.hu online gambling platform, generating tens of billions of forints in annual revenue and paying billions in dividends.

The same Italian address was entered for Habony’s main holding company, Enter-TNMNT Invest, which receives a large share of the proceeds from the casino business. The company, wholly owned by Habony, reported HUF 8.8 billion in dividends and HUF 8.4 billion in after-tax profit last year. The money is linked to dividend payments by Garinvest Projekt Zrt., at the top of the Garancsi–Habony casino ownership structure.

Árpád Habony’s Italian address in company listings

Varese, northern Italy attracts Orbán-linked investors

Varese lies about 50 kilometers north of Milan, close to the Swiss border, in one of Italy’s wealthiest regions. Its lakes, Alpine surroundings and high standard of living have long made it attractive to affluent families and foreign residents.

The address change follows another high-profile property deal in the city. In May, Telex, citing the Italian newspaper Domani, reported that a Hungarian government-linked circle had bought a Varese luxury villa for €4.3 million, or roughly HUF 1.7 billion. The ultimate owner remains concealed behind a private equity fund, but people involved in the transaction have previously worked in the trusted circles of Habony and former defense minister Kristóf Szalay-Bobrovniczky.

That property, measuring more than 1,000 square meters, has a large garden, swimming pool, gym, internal lift, a 256-square-metre garage and views over Lake Varese.

It previously belonged to fashion designer Margherita Maccapani Missoni, an heir to the Missoni fashion house,

and her then-husband, racing driver and entrepreneur Eugenio Amos. Fashion publications including Harper’s Bazaar published photographs of the family’s home.

The villa now listed as Habony’s address is a different property. Italian land-registry documents show two units at the address: a 253-square-metre villa extending from the basement to the second floor and a separate 101-square-metre ground-floor apartment with a balcony. The latest recorded modification dates from May 2021, when the properties were combined and their interiors altered.

The registered owners are Stefano and Ugo Castelnovo, members of a local real-estate family. Their names appear in property databases as owners of the Varese agency Immobiliare Alfieri Sas di Ugo Castelnovo & C. Listings in the same street indicate a wide price range: one nearly 400-square-metre luxury house is offered for €1.95 million, while another property with similar features is advertised for €750,000.

A long record of luxury and political influence

Habony has featured in Atlatszo investigations since 2011, when the newsroom sought the contracts for the publicly funded television series Marslakók. In 2014, Atlatszo revealed that Budapest’s Museum of Fine Arts had lent ten valuable paintings, worth an estimated HUF 292.5 million, to Brand Lab, a company formerly linked to Habony’s brother. The museum initially refused to disclose where the works were displayed, but reporters established that they had been taken to a Budapest apartment connected to Habony’s family.

Atlatszo also investigated V4NA, a London-registered “international news agency” partly owned by a Habony company.

In 2022, reporters found that its reports were produced not in London but in a Budapest newsroom, something a former employee later confirmed. The operation mainly supplied politically useful foreign stories and narratives to Hungary’s government-aligned media.

A 2019 freedom-of-information request revealed that

Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó had authorized Habony to receive a diplomatic passport despite his holding no state or diplomatic post.

Atlatszo asked Habony, his lawyer, the company linked to the earlier luxury-villa purchase, Ugo Castelnovo and the Castelnovo family’s real-estate agency whether Habony lives in Italy, on what legal basis he uses the property and whether the two Varese transactions are connected. No response had been received by publication.