Word: fourtou
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Messier was forced to resign when French board members joined the biggest North American shareholders--the Bronfman family, led by Vivendi vice chairman Edgar Bronfman Jr.--in concluding that French business honor (not to mention Bronfman billions) could be redeemed only by bringing on a new boss. Jean-Rene Fourtou, a well-respected pharmaceuticals-industry veteran, is now in charge...
...Fourtou, backed by French Establishment businessmen such as the AXA insurance firm's Claude Bebear, said Vivendi's future will be sorted out over the next three months. The stock rallied in response, but the company is $18 billion in debt, has no clear strategy and may need $5.8 billion to cover debts and contingent liabilities this year. Though Vivendi reported revenues of $56 billion last year, it also recorded the largest corporate loss in French history--about $12 billion--caused mainly by writing down the value of assets. Vivendi's stock fell 85% from its peak before Messier...
...Monod - a former official at Vivendi's French rival Suez. Their view that Messier would bankrupt his corporate creation - discrediting the entire Paris Bourse in the process - was pressed upon Chirac allies on Vivendi's board, and down went Messier. Replacing him is Jean-René Fourtou, the non-executive vice chairman of Franco-German pharmaceutical giant Aventis and respected baron of French business. Staid, solid and focused on getting Vivendi past its liquidity crunch, Fourtou will also likely sell off some Vivendi assets and establish a tighter, slimmer industrial strategy. That's not exactly the "think big" spirit that...
...Emperor of Ethiopia and thus enable them to be pawned at a fabulous profit by Stavisky? "I had no doubt of their value!" swore Defendant Farault last week. "Ah, no! I never had any river pebbles in my hands!" Why did 75-year-old retired General Joseph Bardi de Fourtou lend his name as "front" to one of the Stavisky companies? On the stand last week the nervous old General protested his innocence to the point of dragging in, apparently without a scrap of pertinence, French Premier Pierre Laval. "I had complete confidence in Stavisky because so many important persons...