Word: vivendi
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...spun his stake in Matra into a 15% share of EADS, which makes Airbus jets. His son Arnaud, 41, is leading the growth of Lagardere's media division, with about $8 billion in annual sales. Last October Arnaud agreed to acquire the book-publishing arm of ailing Vivendi Universal for $1.25 billion--giving Lagardere an estimated 70% of the French book market. In a strange twist, a shadowy Swiss-based firm with links to Iraq and possibly Saddam Hussein owns about 2% of Lagardere's shares, but the holdings were frozen...
...Snow's first instinct may have been right - with foreign investment in the U.S. down 85% since 2000, the currently wimpy dollar may yet be punching above its weight. Broken Records EUROBLUES It's not because I'm in competition with Thierry Breton that I announce these results," said Vivendi CEO Jean-René Fourtou), but the CEOs were locked in a race to the bottom, kicked off on Wednesday when Breton's France Telecom announced a €20.7 billion loss - the biggest in French corporate history. But Vivendi reclaimed the title the next day with...
...plenty of company. Using cheap debt and inflated equity as currency, scores of firms expanded internationally during the go-go 1990s--not just through exporting, but by making direct foreign investments--and lost big. From tech (Gateway Computer) to financial services (Merrill Lynch) to media (Vivendi Universal) to energy (TXU and others), many firms are scrambling to restore their balance sheets after disastrous foreign campaigns. Partly as a consequence, U.S. foreign direct investment was down 55% in the first half of this year compared with the same period in 1999, when it peaked at $175 billion for the year...
Perhaps the "vigorous exchange" between Tony Blair and Jacques Chirac over agriculture policy put Vivendi CEO Jean-Rene Fourtou in the mood for an old-fashioned Anglo-French spat. It's tough to see why else Fourtou last week rejected Vodafone's €6.8 billion offer for Vivendi's stake in mobile-phone operator Cegetel. The sale could have eased Vivendi's crippling €19 billion debt. Just as importantly, to retain control of Cegetel Vivendi must now pre-empt Vodafone's bid for the shares held by BT and SBC, costing the cash-strapped company between...
...Turning Each Other On The U.K.'s two largest commercial broadcasters, Carlton and Granada, agreed on merger plans to create a new company worth over $4 billion. The deal will face strict regulatory scrutiny. There's No Place Like Home Further undoing former CEO Jean-Marie Messier's strategy, Vivendi is moving control from New York back to Paris. Vivendi will also finalize its €12 billion disposal plan this week. Growing Pings HSBC continued its international expansion, buying a 10% stake in China's No. 2 insurer, Ping An, for $600 million. INDICATORS Chocolate Prices Get Hot Cocoa prices...