Hungarian police have opened a misappropriation and money-laundering investigation into the companies of Gyula Balásy, one of the country’s most prominent media and advertising figures and a long-time architect of Viktor Orbán’s government propaganda campaigns, Reuters reported.

In a statement late Tuesday that was cited by the news agency, police said the investigation, opened on information from the tax authority NAV’s special unit, was directed at “an unknown perpetrator” but encompassed Balásy’s events-organizing group of companies.  Balásy disclosed his role in the investigation in a weekend interview with the news site Kontroll, Reuters said. 

“During the investigation, funds have been seized and accounts have been frozen,” the statement said. Police announced a second, parallel investigation into the same group of companies over alleged overpriced public contracts, also targeting an “unknown perpetrator,” the news agency reported.

The action came a day after Balásy publicly offered to transfer his Lounge Group companies and some private investments to the Hungarian state, saying he was doing so “not because I have something to hide or because we have done something unlawful or wrong.” His Lounge Group told Reuters in response to a request for comment on Wednesday that Balásy “cooperates with the police and all relevant authorities and is available any time.” 

Balásy said the accounts of several of his firms had been frozen as of last Monday, according to the report. 

The probe comes as center-right opposition leader Péter Magyar, whose Tisza party ousted Orbán in last month’s election after 16 years in power, is set to take power and crack down on corruption. On April 28, Magyar said Hungarian tax authorities had blocked attempts by unidentified people linked to a top Orbán aide to move funds abroad.

Balásy’s offer to hand over his companies has been rejected by Magyar, according to a report by the Financial Times. 

“You can shed crocodile tears and pretend to feel remorse, but there is no forgiveness for those who robbed the Hungarian people,” Magyar wrote on Facebook, according to the FT. “The [Orbán] system may collapse much faster than many people think.” Some executives and members of Orbán’s family have fled Hungary, while others have pledged allegiance to the incoming government.

Balásy’s firms—including Lounge Design, New Land Media, and Media Dynamics—were the creative engine behind a string of Orbán’s signature campaigns, from anti-immigration messaging to the “war or peace” anti-Ukraine push that framed the April vote, Reuters reported. Transparency International has estimated that in the 2019–2021 period alone, the three companies won 295 billion forints (about $960 million) in state contracts, mostly from Hungary’s National Communications Office. 

According to the Financial Times, Balásy’s companies derived more than 90 percent of their business from the National Communications Office, which was controlled by Orbán’s former chief of staff Antal Rogán. The office in turn directed more than half of its contracts to Balásy. 

Citing the Corruption Research Centre Budapest, the FT reported that the firms’ revenue over the past five years for which data is available exceeded €2 billion ($2.3 billion), generating €260 million in after-tax profit, of which €220 million was withdrawn as dividends.

“They did not work on the free market,” CRCB director István János Tóth told the FT. “They essentially worked for a single client, the NKH, amid extreme corruption risk and extreme winning odds [which] raise questions on the culpability of both Balásy and the NKH leaders.”