Daniel Kretinsky is a Francophile. JOEL SAGET / AFP
INVESTIGATION – Selected by Vivendi to buy the publishing group Editis, the Czech billionaire who made his fortune in energy has infiltrated all aspects of our country’s economy.
The sudden arrival of Daniel Kretinsky at the heart of French capitalism sounded like a coup de theater in the billionaires’ ball in Paris. “He is very young, from another generation than ours and it is an asset, it must be said. He is never ready to invest sums at a loss, even to afford the media. It’s not the service pigeon”entrust to Figaro Xavier Niel, the founder of Free and shareholder of World.
Illustrious unknown in France, the 47-year-old Czech businessman has won in just four years several hundred million euros in assets in the country. Far from his first love in the energy sector, the European king of coal has seized French media well known to the general public (Marianne, Elle Or TV7days)before inviting itself by surprise to the capital of TF1, and of the tricolor flagship of the distribution Fnac-Darty, of which it is today a shareholder up to 20%. “He is everywhere, very rich and, above all, very patient”summarizes an investment banker
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