Bernard Arnault, Chairman and CEO of LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton, attends a information convention to give the 2022 annual result of LVMH in Paris, France, January 26, 2023.
Gonzalo Fuentes | Reuters
The Paris public prosecutor’s place of work is investigating LVMH CEO Bernard Arnault over monetary transactions involving Russian oligarch Nikolai Sarkisov.
French newspaper Le Monde reported Thursday, mentioning France’s Tracfin monetary intelligence unit, that Sarkisov had purchased actual property at an Alpine lodge with the assistance of a mortgage from Arnault.
The Paris prosecutor’s place of work showed Friday {that a} initial investigation were underway since 2022, and {that a} Tracfin record “drawing the eye of the prosecutor’s place of work to operations regarding Mr. Bernard Arnault and Mr. Sarkisov, more likely to symbolize acts of cash laundering, has been connected to this process.”
The prosecutor’s place of work declined to remark additional at the ongoing investigations. A initial investigation does no longer essentially suggest wrongdoing, and Le Monde cited a detailed affiliate of Arnault as announcing the deal used to be performed inside the scope of French regulation.
Arnault, founder, CEO and chairman of the arena’s greatest luxurious items corporate and one of the most international’s richest males, misplaced a prime court docket case towards French tax investigators in February over the legality of a 2019 raid on LVMH’s headquarters. The raid associated with a tax fraud probe connected to actions in Belgium.
Nikolai Sarkisov is a senior determine at his brother Sergey’s Russian insurance coverage corporate, RESO-Garantia.
RESO-Garantia Deputy CEO Igor Ivanov advised CNBC on Friday that neither the corporate, nor Nikolai Sarkisov in my opinion were concerned within the transaction, and that Sarkisov had by no means met Arnault.
“The transaction used to be controlled via a small funding unit which invests professionally in Ecu actual property. It consisted of obtaining apartments in an outdated construction in Courchevel from quite a lot of personal homeowners, with the view to promote them later to a developer as soon as all the construction used to be purchased out,” Ivanov mentioned in an electronic mail.
“All transactions have been performed via French corporations, thru French notaries via French attorneys on each side. This used to be a same old actual property deal.”
He added that neither the corporate nor Sarkisov had won any request for paperwork from French government.
LVMH didn’t reply to CNBC’s request for remark.