Paris (AFP)
Xavier Niel, founder of the telecoms operator Free, will transfer his stake in the Le Monde group to an endowment fund, which will make it non-transferable, thus taking a first step towards the group's capital independence.
"The endowment fund project announced at the end of 2019 should see the light of day during the first quarter of 2021", indicates the Le Monde group in a press release published Wednesday evening.
This fund will receive "the participation in the capital of the Le Monde group held, currently or in the future, directly or indirectly, by Xavier Niel", he explains.
His participation in the weekly L'Obs will also be contributed to this fund which will eventually hold Xavier Niel's "majority stakes" in French newspapers.
Asked by AFP, Mr. Niel did not specify the exact level of his participation in the endowment fund.
The businessman specified "that he would not derive any tax interest from the creation of the endowment fund and that his sole objective was to consolidate the independence of the group's securities", reports the press release, co-signed by Louis Dreyfus, chairman of the board of the newspaper Le Monde, and by Jérôme Fenoglio, director of the daily.
"The participations in the Le Monde group and in the Obs held by the fund will be statutorily inalienable", it is underlined in the press release.
This decision materializes a project that Xavier Niel himself had suggested a year earlier to preserve the independence of the capital of Le Monde, after the tensions caused by the indirect entry into the capital of the Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky at the end of 2018.
The daily capital is 75% controlled by the company Le Monde Libre.
This company is 80% owned by three shareholders: the duo Matthieu Pigasse / Daniel Kretinsky, Xavier Niel and Berlys Media, owned by Madison Cox (heir to Pierre Bergé).
The remaining 20% of Le Monde Libre belong to the Spanish press group Prisa.
Daniel Kretinsky had bought 49% of the shares of the banker Matthieu Pigasse in Le Monde Libre at the end of 2018, which had caused tensions, since fallout, between Matthieu Pigasse and Xavier Niel.
"The endowment fund is obviously open to all other shareholders of the company Le Monde Libre", it is specified in the press release.
According to the press release, representatives of the independence pole and trade unions questioned shareholders about possible disagreements with Madison Cox, widower of Pierre Bergé, former shareholder.
"In his name and in the name of Matthieu Pigasse, Xavier Niel replied that they were both convinced that Madison Cox would respect the commitments made by Pierre Bergé in the continuity of the rescue of the Le Monde Group initiated in 2010", is he reported.
By creating this endowment fund, Le Monde is following in the footsteps of Liberation and Médiapart, which also created this type of non-profit structure, making it possible to protect a company's capital by making it non-transferable.
"This announcement goes in the right direction, but on these questions the devil is in the details. We can only rejoice when the details of the status of the fund and its governance are known," reacted to AFP economist Julia Cagé, media specialist, also president of the Le Monde group's readers' society.
© 2020 AFP