This article is part of a series published by IPI exploring the role of media owners with cross-sectoral business interests in shaping the media landscape in Central and Eastern Europe. This includes examining the relationship of their business interests to the state and implications of their involvement in the media sector for independent journalism. This series is part of IPI’s work researching the phenomenon of media capture in the region. The present article profiles Serbian media owner Igor Žeželj, whose pro-government media holdings reflect the system of mutual dependency between the Serbian state and certain media owners.

In the beginning there was a woman. To be more precise, there were two women, classmates from school. One was Klára, the partner of lawyer Daniel Křetínský; the other was Iva, the wife of one of the co-owners of the financial group J&T, Dušan Palcr. It was through them that Křetínský and Palcr met and became friends in the mid-1990s. This friendship brought Daniel Křetínský to the J&T financial group in 1999, where he rose up to become a partner in 2003, meaning he could share in the profits of the deals he worked on.

The biggest deals were made with a semi-state energy company called CEZ (about 70 per cent of shares are owned by the Czech Republic), where Křetínský managed to find many allies across all levels of management.

In 2004, Křetínský convinced the majority owners of the J&T group to buy the Sparta Prague football club, one of the two most famous clubs in the country. Křetínský came to personify the new football-owning elite and, from there, started to establish a public face beyond the business world.

2009 was a turning point in Daniel Křetínský’s career when he arranged two hugely profitable deals for the J&T Group. He negotiated the purchase of both the German mining company Mibrag and the Czech assets of the UK company International Power (today Engie Energy Company) for ČEZ.

Here, Křetínský’s qualities, described by business partners and competitors alike, were on full display for the first time: high intelligence and the ability to create bold business strategies, along with the diligence and persuasiveness to ensure their implementation.

As a reward for these deals, Daniel Křetínský acquired 20 percent of the newly formed EPH (Energy and Industrial Holding) group, alongside J&T (40 percent) and the PPF group of the richest Czech businessman, Petr Kellner, now deceased (40 percent).

Growth of the holding and share

EPH embarked on an acquisition spree across Europe, acquiring more mining companies and, most importantly, a 49 percent stake in Slovak transit pipelines, which pushed the value of the EPH group and Křetínský’s assets significantly upwards.

In 2014, EPH bought out PPF’s stake for about €1.25 billion. This increased the stake of the other shareholders, bringing Křetínský’s share to 37 percent and that of Patrik Tkáč, a key figure in the J&T group, to 37 percent.

Two years later, part of the stake in one branch of EPH holding was bought by the Australian company Macquarie. The most recent publicly announced ownership changes in the entire EPH holding and a number of other related entities took place at the end of 2020. After their implementation, Křetínský owns 50 percent plus one share of EPH, Patrik Tkáč 44 percent minus one share, and the remaining six percent belongs to the group’s top managers.

At least as important as the development of the ownership structure was and is the overall growth of the group around Daniel Křetínský and Patrik Tkáč. After a series of investments in energy sources of all types (from nuclear to coal to so-called sustainable), the power plants of EPH Holding have a total installed capacity of 26 GWe, which is significantly more than the sum of all energy sources in the Czech Republic. Other huge assets are in energy distribution, industry and other related sectors.

At the same time, however, Křetínský and Tkáč also jointly invested in different sectors. Together they have bought and sold large volumes of shares in global companies such as Foot Locker and Macy’s. Two large investments stand out. They own more than 45 per cent of the German Metro AG supermarket chain and more than a quarter –  and the largest – stake in the UK’s Royal Mail. They made a similarly sized investment in the French retail chain Casino.

Media acquisitions

The EPH  group, represented by Daniel Křetínský, entered the media business in the Czech Republic at the end of 2013 when it bought Czech News Centre, formerly owned by Ringier Axel Springer. This purchase was part of a larger reorientation of the Czech media landscape. Earlier, in June 2013, the publishing house Mafra – which included the largest and most respected Czech newspaper at the time, the MF DNES daily – was bought by billionaire and budding politician Andrej Babiš from the German RBVG group. Babis, backed by his newly acquired media assets, became finance minister after the 2013 elections, and then four years later, prime minister.

Křetínský and Tkáč, recognizing the change in the market and strategic importance of investing in media,  approached Ringier Axel Springer before the opportunity was lost. By buying their own media they may have sought a form of insurance and counterbalance to Babiš’s power and media expansion. They also spoke about the goal of further developing the publishing house, though no significant investments in the media have been made since.

Some of the smaller media outlets from Křetínský and Tkáč’s publishing house criticized Babiš, while the key tabloid Blesk was rather friendly towards him. Babiš, on the other hand, did not criticize the business interests of Daniel Křetínský and company

French involvement

In the spring of 2018, Czech Media Invest (CMI), a company controlled by Křetínský and Tkáč, bought radio stations in the Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia, and Romania from the French group Lagardére.

In the same year, CMI entered the French press market directly. It bought the socio-political magazine Marianne, began negotiations to buy several magazine titles, including Elle, from the Lagardére group, and joined the shareholders of Le Monde.

The group’s involvement in Le Monde’s shareholding structure provoked a backlash in the newspaper’s editorial office, fearful he may have been seeking to influence coverage in favour of his energy industry assets. Daniel Křetínský commented years later in an interview with the Financial Times: ‘We entered a door that we thought was open and that everyone knew we would enter. And then we discovered that we had entered the room without informing the people inside. The negative reaction was perfectly natural.”

In the fall of 2023, Křetínský and company ended their position in the ownership structure of Le Monde, selling the stake to NJJ Presse, the company of telecommunications businessman Xavier Niel, which announced that it would subsequently transfer all of its ownership rights to the Fund for Presse Independence upon completion of the transaction.

Křetínský, through his company International Media Invest, remains a shareholder in the magazines, which he entered through the deal with the Lagardére group. He is also a major creditor of Libération. The purchase of a 100 per cent stake in Editis, the second-largest book publisher in the French market, was also announced in 2023.

When energy and media intersect

The publishing and media sector makes up only a small part of the total business of the group controlled by Daniel Křetínský and Patrik Tkáč. The most important sector was and is energy. In the Czech Republic, the two areas intersected in the summer and autumn of 2023.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine changed the energy market, leading to a sharp drop in the volume of gas transported via transit pipelines from Russia to Europe. A company called Net4Gas (N4G) operates just such a transit gas link on Czech territory.

After the outbreak of the war and the reduction in Russian gas purchases, the company found itself in economic difficulties and its existing shareholders, Allianz Infrastructure Luxembourg and Borealis Novus Parent, wanted to sell. The EPH group and subsequently the Czech state each expressed interest in buying the pipeline network. The state justified this mainly on the grounds of strategic security interests in the energy sector.

Křetínský’s media strongly criticized the state’s interest, but without mentioning that their owners had economic interests in this deal. After the state defeated Křetínský and company with its bid to buy the pipelines, a series of pieces critical of the minister of industry, the main figure in the deal for the state, appeared in the tabloid Blesk. This sudden interest of the most read tabloid title in the Minister of Industry Jozef Síkela could be seen as an act of revenge for crossing Křetínský’s interests.

A spokesman for EPH Holding publicly stressed that the group does not interfere in any way in the content of its media. In an open letter to Daniel Křetínský, the Czech section of the International Press Institute (CZ IPI) called for greater transparency when EPH media report issues in which there is  a hidden conflict of interest. With the exception of Andrej Babiš’s misuse of his own media to advance his interests, this degree of use of ownership influence in the media to promote a particular business interest was unprecedented in the Czech Republic.

Deals with the public sector

While in the case of the Net4Gas pipeline buyout the interests of the state and Křetínský were at odds, but in many other areas they can be in harmony.

In the case of Andrej Babiš and his extreme influence in the Czech agri-food chain, the term “from pitchfork to fork” has been used; the same is partly true of Daniel Křetínský in the energy sector. His EPH, with more than 70 companies, brings together coal mines, power and heating plants and distribution networks in its pan-European network. This represents an opportunity for EPH’s business with the state.

For instance, Křetínský’s Energetický a průmyslový holding has supplied hundreds of thousands of households in western, northern and eastern Bohemia with heat and electricity through its heating plants and power stations, as well as a number of commercial enterprises and state and public institutions such as schools and hospitals.

Křetínský’s EP Energy Trading, a supplier of electricity and natural gas, serves more than 70,000 customers in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, including a number of municipalities.

Due to its competence in the energy sector, Křetínský’s companies are also able to successfully compete for public contracts in the field of electrical installation, construction of distribution facilities or reconstruction of transmission lines.

EPH’s public sector deals are not limited to the energy sector. For example, the state-owned company Správa železnic (Railway Administration) orders services from companies backed by Křetínský and Tkáč’s holdings (such as Tramo Rail or Elektrizace železnic Praha). The volume of contracts in the area of transport infrastructure is usually in the tens of millions of crowns. Currently, Křetínský’s companies are involved in the reconstruction of one of the railway stations in Brno with a total value of €125 million, as part of a network of other contractors.

There are also opportunities for collaboration with the state within the media sector. Given their high readership (newspapers and magazines) and listenership (radio stations), it is not surprising that state and public institutions often advertise in the media owned by Křetínský. The City of Prague is also a significant advertiser on Frekvence 1 and Evropa 2 radio stations, which are part of Křetínský’s portfolio.

What’s more, in 2021, Křetínský’s CMI News signed a contract for around €1.2 million (excluding tax) to provide editorial services for the BusinessInfo portal of the state agency CzechTrade.

Křetínský’s portfolio also includes bus manufacturer SOR Libchavy and a stake in waste management company AVE. Both businesses serve municipalities ,ensuring the public sector is a significant business partner.

“All of the EPH Group’s business activities in the Czech Republic account for only one per cent of EPH’s total turnover,” emphasized Daniel Častvaj, a spokesman for Křetínský and Tkáč’s group, adding that business with the Czech public sector is only a smaller part of this one per cent.

However, if the group had succeeded in its intended deal with Net4Gas, this share of turnover would have been higher. At the same time, Křetínský’s holding does not count the media business in that one per cent of turnover, as they are formally in a different structure.

To put this in context, it is also necessary to mention the total turnover of the EPH group, which in 2022 was €37.1 billion (compared to €19 billion in 2021). EPH Group’s EBITDA for 2022 was €4.3 billion.

Safeguards are always essential

Although the deals with the Czech state and municipalities are a minority in terms of the total turnover of the entire group that Daniel Křetínský and Patrik Tkáč control, they still represent interesting business opportunities. And when the state thwarted the business plans of Daniel Křetínský, his media reacted very critically.

In conclusion, Křetínský is a highly successful Czech business mogul whose investments in media have provided him with both prestige and influence. Křetínský made his initial fortunes in the heavily state-regulated energy sector and maintaining close relations would have been important for that initial success, but he and his companies have long outgrown their dependency on the Czech State. And while the Czech public sector is an important client for many of Křetínský’s current businesses this represents only a small proportion of his overall wealth, which reduces the risk for him and his media being  vulnerable to state capture.

Nevertheless, there are always grounds for scrutiny and close monitoring when any single individual with a wide scope of business interests is able to gain such a large stake in a nation’s media. This includes the risk of conflict of interest when the energy industry invests in influential media such as Le Monde, which play a crucial role shaping today’s debate about the transition to clean energy.  While there is little sign, with the exception of the Net4Gas case, of Křetínský using his media assets to pursue his interests, the scope of cross-sector ownership in this case is a reminder of the need for strong safeguards to protect newsroom editorial independence and to protect media pluralism within each market.

This series on the impact of media owners with cross-sectoral business interests on the media landscape in Central and Eastern Europe is supported with funding from the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom (FNF).