Bernard Tapie

Bernard Tapie ( born January 26, 1943 in Paris ) is a French businessman, politician and actor.

Entrepreneur

Beginnings and successes

In a humble born in Paris and grew up Le Bourget, he began after his military service in 1963 as a seller of televisions and set up his own in 1964. In 1977 he acquired the paper mill Duverger and two years later sold it at a profit. In 1979 he founded in Paris the investment company Groupe Bernard Tapie. The business model was the purchase and rehabilitation of insolvent companies. Later he was accused of looting the company. It was a conglomeration of different corporate investments (including Testut, look, Terraillon, La Vie Claire, Wonder, Manufrance and especially Adidas ), which was largely financed by the then state-owned bank Crédit Lyonnais. In the early 1990s rejected the Groupe Bernard Tapie annually a profit of five billion francs.

Bankruptcy

Early 90s came Tapie increasing criticism and with the collapse of Crédit Lyonnais in 1993 he lost the Unterstütziung his bank. In autumn 1994, Bernard Tapie declared its insolvency. In July 1996, he was convicted in the affair Testut for infidelity to two years probation and a fine of 300,000 francs. He was particularly in the context of the affair OM found again due to bankruptcy offenses, embezzlement and bribery and sentenced to eight months in prison, of which he served six months in 1997 the end of 1996.

Adidas affair

In Germany Tapie was known primarily through the purchase of a majority stake of the sports goods manufacturer Adidas in 1990. The subsequent sale of this investment then employed for over a decade the courts: Tapie mandated the Crédit Lyonnais in 1994 with the sale of its shares, which the Bank acquired for 2.085 billion francs himself and a few months later sold for almost double to Robert Louis -Dreyfus. Tapie threw Crédit Lyonnais before, to have cheated him and the other shareholders to the excess proceeds. 2005 Tapie was awarded 135 million euros in damages. The decision was reversed by the Paris Court of Cassation. A subsequent arbitration proceedings Tapie said in July 2008, a final compensation of 285 million euros; it finally came to a payment of 403 million euros (including interest) at Tapie.

The government's decision to settle the dispute through arbitration was politically controversial, and in June 2011, the French Justice opened investigations against, among others, the then Economy Minister Christine Lagarde on. In January 2013 took place in the context of this investigation raids among others, Tapie and Stéphane Richard, CEO of France Telecom and former cabinet chief Christine Lagarde, in March 2013 even with Lagarde itself the end of June 2013 was in this case a judicial investigation against Tapie with the justification "of a band-like organized fraud " opened as secretive previous relations between the referee and Tapie had come to light.

Recent transactions

In December 2012, Tapie took over together with Philippe Hersant for 50 million euros a series of Southern French newspapers, including La Provence, Nice- Matin and its offshoot Var - Matin and Corse- Matin, which have been extracted from the debt-ridden Groupe Hersant Média.

Politician

Bernard Tapie was active as a politician of the radical (social liberal ) party. Under the socialist government of Prime Minister Pierre Bérégovoy he was on 2 April 1992 to 3 June 1992 and from 26 December 1992 to 29 March 1993 the French Minister for the needs of cities ( Ministre de la Ville). In 1988 and again in March 1993, he was elected for the department of Bouches -du -Rhône in the French National Assembly.

2007 and 2012 supported Tapie the election campaign of the conservative candidate Nicolas Sarkozy.

Sports

Bernard Tapie was at the beginning of the 60s working as a driver in Formula 3; but after a serious accident, he gave up racing. Mid-80s caught Tapie sensation with the acquisition of the French cycling team La Vie Claire. On the payroll of the team were names such as Bernard Hinault, Greg LeMond, Steve Bauer, Andrew Hampsten and Jean -François Bernard. " La Vie Claire " became in the period from 1983 to 1987 one of the most successful teams of the decade and won several important victories, including three wins in the Tour de France by LeMond and Hinault.

Bernard Tapie was between 1986 and 1994 shareholder and president of the French football club Olympique Marseille. At this time the club was extremely successful. Olympique Marseille reached from 1989 to 1993 five national titles in a row, won the national cup in 1989 and won the 1993 UEFA Champions League.

These successes were achieved, however, not only sporty. Club president Tapie had paid bribes before the point game against Valenciennes U.S. and contributed so foul to the success of his team. The French Cup Olympique Marseille has been revoked to the club in 1994 demoted to the second division and sentenced Tapie himself in 1997 in the second instance to a term of imprisonment of eight months.

Entertainer

After the first unsuccessful attempts as a singer and entertainer in the 60s and appearances as a television presenter in the late 80s, Tapie started after his bankruptcy in 1996 to act as an actor, musician, presenter and writer, because it no longer was possible to follow his earlier interests: he was personally bankrupt and therefore could not make any enterprise start-ups, he could not run a political office, and he was banned from football. First, he turned to the film. He played together with Fabrice Luchini, in Claude Lelouch's film Hommes, femmes, mode d' emploi ( Men, Women: A Handbook ) from the year 1996.

In 1998, he appeared in the song C'est beau la vie by the French artist Doc Gynéco with.

Under the title Who is Bernard Tapie? was filmed a documentary about Tapie in 2001 by the American filmmaker Marina Zenovich.