{"id":14974,"date":"2025-09-22T09:38:35","date_gmt":"2025-09-22T09:38:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/infundpros.com\/?p=14974"},"modified":"2025-09-22T09:38:37","modified_gmt":"2025-09-22T09:38:37","slug":"luxury-billionaire-bernard-arnault-joins-french-outcry-over-deadly-wealth-tax-proposal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/infundpros.com\/?p=14974","title":{"rendered":"Luxury billionaire Bernard Arnault joins French outcry over \u2018deadly\u2019 wealth tax proposal"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

French business leaders have billed the left\u2019s proposal for a new tax on the very wealthy as \u201cinsane\u201d and \u201ccommunist\u201d, as the Socialist party pressures Emmanuel Macron\u2019s new prime minister to ensure the rich pay their fair share in efforts to narrow the public deficit. <\/p>\n

The Socialists\u2019 votes are essential for the survival of premier S\u00e9bastien Lecornu, after the hung parliament toppled two prime ministers in less than a year over their attempts to limit public spending. The leftwing lawmakers are pressing for people with fortunes of more than \u20ac100mn to pay a minimum of 2 per cent tax annually on all their assets, including their companies, shares of companies and unrealised gains.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Bernard Arnault, chief executive of luxury conglomerate LVMH, said the push amounted to a \u201cclearly stated desire to destroy the French economy\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cI cannot believe that the French political forces that govern or have governed the country could lend any credibility to this offensive, which is deadly for our economy,\u201d the billionaire said in a statement. <\/p>\n

Arnault is not alone in opposing this idea. \u00c9ric Larchev\u00eaque, a co-founder of crypto wallet company Ledger, told the Financial Times: \u201cIt\u2019s collectivism, it\u2019s communism\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009it\u2019s a fundamental attack on my freedom and right to property.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

With Ledger last valued at \u20ac1.3bn by venture capital investors, Larchev\u00eaque\u2019s stake puts his fortune high enough that he would have to pay the new wealth tax even though the unlisted start-up does not make a profit, nor pay dividends.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If enacted, the so-called Zucman tax \u2014 named after Gabriel Zucman, the economist who floated the idea \u2014 would be a blow to Macron\u2019s business-friendly agenda since he was first elected in 2017, pledging to turn France into \u201ca start-up nation\u201d.<\/p>\n

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\u00c9ric Larchev\u00eaque, co-founder of crypto wallet company Ledger, says the wealth tax is an \u2018attack on my freedom\u2019<\/span> \u00a9 Marlene Awaad\/Bloomberg<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

One of the president\u2019s first moves was to water down a net wealth tax on people\u2019s personal assets above a certain threshold by replacing it with a narrower tax on real estate assets. He also gradually cut corporate taxes from 33 per cent to 25 per cent, and applied a flat tax of 30 per cent on capital gains.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But Macron went on to pay a high political price for those tax cuts, with opponents quickly tagging him as the \u201cpresident of the rich\u201d.<\/p>\n

Macron remained strongly opposed to wealth taxes and saw Zucman\u2019s proposal as an aberration, said a person familiar with his thinking. Lecornu told French regional newspapers that he was open to discussing \u201ctax fairness and sharing the burden\u201d, but warned that \u201cprofessional assets\u201d needed to be handled with \u201ccare\u201d. <\/p>\n

Advocates of the Zucman tax claim it will raise \u20ac15bn a year, reducing the need for spending cuts when tackling the public deficit, which is expected to reach 5.4 per cent of GDP by the end of the year \u2014 one of the highest in the Eurozone. <\/p>\n

But other economists said it could raise just \u20ac5bn. Lecornu\u2019s predecessor Fran\u00e7ois Bayrou was toppled over his proposed 2026 budget, which included \u20ac44bn worth of spending cuts and tax increases.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Arnault billed Zucman a \u201cfar-left activist\u201d whose \u201cideology aims to destroy the liberal economy\u201d. Arnault is one of the wealthiest people in the world, largely due to his controlling shareholding in the \u20ac256bn Paris-listed luxury group he built.<\/p>\n

Zucman\u2019s \u201cpseudo-academic competence is widely debated\u201d, Arnault said, adding it was aimed at him personally, given he was \u201ccertainly the largest individual taxpayer and one of the largest corporate taxpayers through the companies I run\u201d.<\/p>\n

Zucman described Arnault\u2019s criticism as \u201cbaseless\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cComing from one of the richest men in the world and in a context where academic freedom is being called into question in a growing number of countries, this rhetoric\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009should worry us all,\u201d Zucman wrote on X, adding: \u201cIt\u2019s time to tax billionaires at a minimum rate.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Zucman tax would be particularly problematic for the owners of promising tech start-ups that, despite their high valuations on paper, often do not generate a profit or dividends. These individuals could face tax bills that exceed any liquid assets they have.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The pro-Zucman camp argued that start-up founders could just pay their tax bills by handing over shares of their companies to a French sovereign wealth fund or by borrowing \u2014 both heavily contested ideas.<\/p>\n

Critics, however, argue the tax may be unconstitutional given how it would affect a small group of about 1,800 people.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Philippe Corrot, co-founder of tech start-up Mirakl, which is valued at $3.5bn, told the FT it was \u201cabsurd\u201d and \u201cdangerous\u201d to \u201cput people in a situation of having to sell\u201d parts of their companies to pay taxes.<\/p>\n

But the argument that more should be done to tax the super-rich is a popular one in a country that is home to some of the world\u2019s wealthiest people, such as Arnault or the billionaire families behind Herm\u00e8s and L\u2019Or\u00e9al.\u00a0<\/p>\n

More than half a million people marched through the streets of Paris and other French cities last week to protest against looming spending cuts, and many carried signs that called for taxing the rich.\u00a0<\/p>\n

An Ifop study commissioned by the Socialists recently found that 86 per cent of those polled supported the Zucman tax.<\/p>\n

\u201cWho is going to say no if you say \u2018let\u2019s tax the rich at 2 per cent?\u2019\u201d said Fabrice Le Sach\u00e9, vice-chair of the business lobby Medef and founder of a carbon credit trading company. \u201cIt\u2019s hard for people to understand that the value of a company is not cash in your pocket.\u201d<\/p>\n

Many business leaders now believe some form of wealth tax has become inevitable, but hope for a toned-down version. One option would be to extend supposedly temporary measures that were included in this year\u2019s budget, such as a tax top-off on people earning more than \u20ac250,000 a year, as well as a rise in taxes on big companies.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone must make an effort, and no one has said that we don\u2019t want to pay taxes\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009But it mustn\u2019t discourage people from taking risks, it mustn\u2019t be confiscatory,\u201d said Mirakl\u2019s Corrot.<\/p>\n

\u201cWould I have created Mirakl in France 15 years ago if these taxes existed?\u201d<\/p>\n

Additional reporting by Ian Johnston<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Read the full article here<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

French business leaders have billed the left\u2019s proposal for a new tax on the very wealthy as \u201cinsane\u201d and \u201ccommunist\u201d, as the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14975,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-14974","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business"},"yoast_head":"\nLuxury billionaire Bernard Arnault joins French outcry over \u2018deadly\u2019 wealth tax proposal | inFundPros<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"French business leaders have billed the left\u2019s proposal for a new tax on the very wealthy as \u201cinsane\u201d and \u201ccommunist\u201d, as the Socialist party pressures\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link 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