Transactions involving Bernard Arnault investigated over suspected money laundering
The Paris public prosecutor’s office is investigating financial transactions allegedly involving the French billionaire Bernard Arnault and a Russian businessman.
The prosecutors are investigating transactions involving Arnault, whose ownership of the luxury goods group LVMH has made him the world’s second richest person after Elon Musk, and Nikolai Sarkisov, Reuters reported, citing a statement from the Paris prosecutor’s office. Sarkisov’s brother, Sergei, founded the Russian insurance company Reso-Garantia.
The French newspaper Le Monde first reported the existence of the investigation, citing transactions involving property at the Courchevel ski resort. It cited a December 2022 document from Tracfin, part of France’s justice system focused on combating money laundering, which reportedly lists transactions “which may characterise money laundering”.
A spokesperson forReso-Garantia said that “neither Reso-Garantia, nor Mr Sarkisov personally, has been involved in the transaction that was described in the Le Monde article. Mr Sarkisov and Mr Arnault have never met.”
The spokesperson said Sarkisov and Reso-Garantiahad received no contact or requests for documents from French authorities, or those of other countries.
Arnault’s fortune is estimated to be worth $164bn (£134bn), according to Bloomberg, and it at one point it made him the world’s richest man on paper. He and his family own 41% of LVMH, the group that owns luxury brands including the handbag brand Louis Vuitton, Moët champagne, Hennessy cognac, the jeweller Tiffany’s and the watchmaker Tag Heuer, among many others.
Arnault, who is 74, is preparing to hand on his empire, which he founded 35 years ago and grew by acquiring some of the world’s best-known fashion brands and expanding sales to aspiring consumers in Asia in particular. In January, he appointed his daughter, Delphine, to run Christian Dior, the secondbiggest brand in LVMH in a move that some analysts said set the scene for a family race with her brother, Antoine, over who would run the company.
The Paris investigation is reportedly looking at transactions involving the purchase of 14 properties in the French Alpine resort of Courchevel during a period of a few weeks in the autumn of 2018, according to Le Monde. The properties were reportedly located in Jardin Alpin, a particularly exclusive quarter of the ski resort characterised by expensive restaurants with views of the slopes.
Le Monde reported on Thursday that Sarkisov had acquired real estate at a luxury Alpine resort via a transaction in which Arnault, through one of his companies, had provided a loan.
The spokesperson for Reso-Garantia said: “The transaction was managed by a small investment unit which invests professionally in European real estate. It consisted of acquiring flats in an old building in Courchevel from various private owners, with the view to sell them later to a developer once the entire building was bought out.
“All transactions were carried out by French companies, through French notaries by French lawyers on all sides. This was a usual real estate deal.”
LVMH declined to comment. Le Monde cited a person close to Arnault as saying the transaction had been carried out in full respect of French law.