Arnault applies for Belgian citizenship

LVMH’s CEO and France’s richest man, Bernard Arnault, has applied for Belgian citizenship.

The application has come as France’s president, François Hollande, prepares to implement a 75% tax on the wealthy.

The tax will come into effect later this year and will hit anyone whose earnings exceed €1 million a year, although Hollande has also hinted that once the economy begins to recover then the plan could be scrapped within as little as two years.

Hollande, who once said that he dislikes “the rich”, stated in a television interview that Arnault would not be exempt from the tax and would also have to consider what it truly meant to be Belgian.

“He must weigh up what it means to seek another nationality because we are proud to be French,” he said.

This is not the first time that Arnault has sought refuge abroad during bouts of Socialist governments in France.

When François Mitterand came to power in 1981, Arnault left for the US and returned three years later when French domestic policy became more conservative.

Arnault said that he had no intention of evading tax and that his application for dual-nationality was for “personal reasons”.

He said: “I am and will remain a tax resident in France and in this regard I will, like all French people, fulfil my fiscal obligations.

“Our country must count on everyone to do their bit to face a deep economic crisis amid strict budgetary constraints.”

As well as a tax on the wealthy, Hollande is to implement higher taxes on businesses which will amount to between €15bn and €20bn.

The reasons for Arnault’s move are not yet clear, although he has been linked with an investment project that could be in partnership with a fellow billionaire, co-owner of Cheval Blanc and Belgium’s richest man, Albert Frère; and which would, apparently, be made easier with Belgian nationality.

Parties on both the left and right in France have criticised the news as “scandalous”.