Picasso in corruption case

A London art dealer has been charged by the US Department of Justice with plotting to launder dirty money by selling a Picasso, says Harry Wilson in The Times. According to the indictment, Matthew Green – the son of Richard Green, one of London’s most powerful art dealers – told an FBI agent posing as a financial fraudster that he could clean his money by selling him Picasso’s Personnages, Painted 11 April 1965 for £6.7m. Green (pictured) would then broker the resale of the painting and transfer the proceeds back to the agent, via a US bank account. In return, he demanded a commission of at least £335,000. The meeting had been arranged by an investment manager at Beaufort Securities – a London broker that has since been closed down by City regulators. The indictment states that Green asked for a 5% profit on the transaction, “so he would not be asked why he was ‘in the money-laundering business’”. He has yet to respond publicly to the charge.