On April 7 the Swiss court of Thun has ruled one of the lawsuits filed by John Elkann and his siblings, Lapo Elkann and Ginevra Elkann, against their mother Margherita Agnelli inadmissible in a dispute over the Agnelli family inheritance.
In its April 2 decision, the court in Thun also ordered the three siblings to cover approximately 816,000 Swiss francs (about $1.04 million) in legal costs, as well as to pay their mother an additional 919,000 Swiss francs.
The case aimed to establish whether Swiss courts had jurisdiction over the estate of Marella Caracciolo, mother of Margherita Agnelli and wife of Gianni Agnelli, the longtime Fiat chairman and a defining figure of Italy’s postwar economic rise.
At the heart of a long-running dispute that has deeply divided one of Italy’s most prominent families, Margherita is seeking to challenge the validity of agreements she signed in 2004. Under those arrangements, concluded after her father’s death, she received approximately €1.2 billion (about $1.4 billion), with the intention of ultimately benefiting her five children from a second marriage. She now contends that those terms did not granted her an equitable share of the Agnelli family holdings.
The lawsuit brought before the court in Thun sought to obtain a ruling confirming the validity of the will of Marella Caracciolo. In particular, it aimed to recognize John Elkann, Lapo Elkann and Ginevra Elkann as heirs, thereby excluding their mother Margherita Agnelli from the succession.
Lawyers for the Elkann siblings criticized the decision as “wrong” and announced their intention to appeal to the higher court of Bern. They reiterated their position that the courts of Thun have jurisdiction over the estate, arguing that Marella Caracciolo had been domiciled in Switzerland since the early 1970s.
A central issue in the dispute concerns Marella’s place of residence in the final years of her life—whether in Switzerland or Italy—following her death in 2019.
Importantly, the Thun ruling did not address the merits of the case. According to the Elkanns’ legal team, it therefore has no impact on the ongoing succession proceedings or on the 2004 agreement between Marella Caracciolo and Margherita Agnelli. That agreement remains a cornerstone of the current ownership structure, particularly with regard to “Dicembre”, the vehicle through which the family controls Exor.
The Elkann siblings’ legal team noted that the principal inheritance proceedings in Switzerland remain pending before the court in Geneva.
Parallel litigation is also ongoing in Italy, where a civil case is before the court in Turin. In that forum, lawyers for Margherita Agnelli maintain that jurisdiction over the inheritance dispute properly belongs to the Italian courts.
Margherita’s legal representatives welcomed the decision of the court in Thun, describing it as likely to have significant repercussions on the broader litigation framework, including both the civil proceedings in Turin and related criminal investigations.
The criminal proceedings in Turin concern allegations of tax fraud, with John Elkann among those under investigation. He has denied any wrongdoing.