Profile
The newspaper Adevarul began its life in 1989 as a successor to Scinteia, a propaganda paper of the former Romanian Communist Party. Adevarul in its early days adopted a controversial editorial position, being criticized for its populist and nationalist content. After being fully privatized, Adevarul became one of the most popular newspapers in Romania. Nevertheless, it was accused of protecting various political and commercial interests. These scandals and tensions led to an internal conflict in 2005 that prompted a spate of the newspaper’s journalists to leave and found a new publication, the newspaper Gandul.
In 2006, Adevarul was bought by the controversial businessman and politician Dinu Patriciu. In the same year, Patriciu founded Adevarul Holding, a media joint stock company whose main purpose was publication of cultural magazines and tabloid newspapers. The company hit insolvency in 2012.
Businessman Cristian Burci took over Adevarul Holding at the end of 2012. By then, the company had accumulated debts nearing €100m.
Adevarul Holding is now owned by Premium News, a company whose main shareholder is the Luxembourg-based firm Graffiti Marketing and Multimedia Holding, controlled by Burci.
Burci founded Graffiti/BBDO, one of the first advertising agencies that appeared in Romania after the fall of communism in 1989. During that first post-communist decade, he began to invest in the media, launching the newspaper Ultimul Cuvant (meaning “last word” in Romania), the first color newspaper in Romania, which lasted about six months on the market. In the mid-1990s, Burci founded Amerom TV station, which later became Prima TV.
In 2003, Burci bought Radio Contact and renamed it Kiss FM. Two years later, he sold Prima TV, Kiss FM and Star FM to SBS Broadcasting, for a total of €30m.
In 2014, the Romanian Competition Council, the country’s antitrust watchdog, gave green light to the takeover of Prima TV by Burci from SBS Broadcasting Media, which held the broadcast license of Prima TV. The company Prime Time Productions behind Prima TV was acquired by Burci via the company Graffiti Red.
In 2020, Clever Business Transilvania, an emerging Romanian media group controlled by local investor Adrian Tomsa, bought the insolvent Prima TV channel from Burci.
In 2016, prosecutors in Romania said that they questioned Burci on suspicion of tax evasion worth €8m, alleging that Burci and nine individuals set up a criminal group that had since 2006 embezzled funds from the railway car maker Romvag Caracal. A statement said that the group also made fictitious transactions that caused further damages of €5.7 million to the state budget. Burci owned several railway car factories, which secured contracts with the state-owned railway freight carrier before being declared insolvent in 2010.
In 2021, Burci was sued along with Liviu Dragnea, a controversial Romanian politician. Burci was accused of influence peddling. According to DNA, the anti-corruption watchdog in Romania, Burci was the liaison between one of the key fundraisers of former US president Donald Trump and Dragnea. Burci arranged Dragnea’s visit to Trump’s inauguration as the president of the United States, promising Trump’s fundraiser contracts with the Romanian Army.In 2022, Burci was indicted by the prosecutors of the Directorate for Investigating Offenses of Organized Crime and Terrorism (DIICOT) for setting up an organized criminal group, fraudulent management, tax evasion, embezzlement with very serious consequences and money laundering. The damages are estimated at nearly €33m, according to a DIICOT statement.
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