PARIS: In a June court filing, luxury-goods giant Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy (LVMH) forcefully denied it had ever tried to acquire shares in rival Hermes from that company’s founding-family heir Nicolas Puech, who alleges he was fleeced of his 6% stake – now worth billions – via schemes involving his late wealth manager.
“The group never contemplated acquiring Nicolas Puech’s stake, let alone against his will,” LVMH stated in the filing, responding to a lawsuit Puech filed last year in France.
But LVMH signed a 2002 agreement to purchase the heir’s shares, legal documents reviewed by Reuters show, in a deal LVMH representatives crafted with Puech’s financial advisor, Eric Freymond, who died last year.
Further, the records reveal, LVMH and its chairman’s family holding company paid Freymond’s management firm at least US$20mil in commissions and fees between 2001 and 2009 as Freymond helped LVMH secretly build a massive stake in Hermes.
The 2002 agreement for Puech’s shares and the scale of the Freymond payments are reported here for the first time.
Taken together, they show LVMH’s relationship with Puech’s wealth manager and confidant was more extensive than previously known and raise questions about recent LVMH denials of any attempt to buy Puech’s Hermes stake.
The revelations mark the latest plot twist in a bitter corporate rivalry between the luxury-goods giants dating back a quarter century, when LVMH first started covertly building its Hermes stake.
Hermes fended off what it called a hostile takeover by LVMH chairman and chief executive officer (CEO) Bernard Arnault after the billionaire surprised investors in October 2010 by disclosing a 17% stake in the smaller rival.
LVMH accumulated as much as 23% in Hermes before agreeing to liquidate its stake in a 2014 truce.
The mystery surrounding the fortune the Hermes heir says is missing continues to play out in Paris courts, raising fresh questions over whether and how his shares ended up as part of the LVMH stake in Hermes.
Arnault had built a luxury empire through acquisitions, starting with Christian Dior before taking control of LVMH in the late 1980s, shortly after its founding in a merger of Louis Vuitton and Moet Hennessy.
Today, LVMH is the world’s biggest luxury firm, with more than 75 brands selling everything from clothes and leather goods to champagne and perfume, and Arnault is among Europe’s richest people.
Hermes, mostly run by members of its founding family, has become one of France’s most valuable listed companies, alongside LVMH, thanks to a focus on ultra-wealthy shoppers and the enduring appeal of its handmade Birkin and Kelly handbags, which can sell for tens of thousands of dollars.
Puech says he didn’t discover his shares had vanished until 2022, after he cut ties with his wealth manager.
Last year, he filed a lawsuit seeking 14bil (US$16bil) in damages from whoever might be found guilty in prosecutors’ parallel probe into his missing fortune –which has targeted Puech’s now-deceased financial advisor and a lawyer who advised LVMH on its covert stakebuilding in the 2000s.
At today’s share prices, Puech’s 6% stake in Hermes would be worth about US$10bil.
Puech’s lawsuit names LVMH and its billionaire chairman as defendants, along with companies affiliated with Freymond.
LVMH argued in its June court filing that buying Puech’s shares would have made no sense because it had planned at the time to take the “opposite” strategy of convincing Puech to join a shareholder bloc to influence Hermes, which the heir couldn’t do without his stake.
But the documents reviewed by Reuters show LVMH signed the 2002 agreement to buy Puech’s shares with the heir’s wealth manager, Freymond, shortly after launching its stake-building effort.
An LVMH spokesman declined to comment on the agreement or its payments to Freymond.
Puech declined to comment, citing ongoing criminal probe. Hermes also declined to comment.
Freymond was fatally struck by a Swiss train in July 2025 as French prosecutors were investigating whether he misappropriated Puech’s shares.
Local prosecutors in Bern, Switzerland, investigated the death and concluded it was a suicide. Freymond denied wrongdoing before his death.
Exactly what happened to the Hermes heir’s shares – and any money paid to buy them – remains unclear.
LVMH has never said whether it purchased Hermes shares owned by Puech.
In its June court filing, LVMH acknowledged working with Freymond to accumulate Hermes shares but said any purchase of Puech’s shares would have been unintentional.
In a previously unreported 2017 Swiss court filing, LVMH said the 2002 agreement to buy Puech’s shares was never executed and that the company was unable to verify that the heir had authorised Freymond to sell the stock.
In May, prosecutors told Reuters they were investigating whether Swiss lawyer Alexandre Montavon “participated in the misappropriation of Nicolas Puech’s Hermes shares for the benefit of LVMH”.
Prosecutors have not filed criminal charges against Montavon.
Montavon told French prosecutors in May that he advised LVMH on the 2002 agreement, according to a transcript of his testimony reviewed by Reuters.
At the same time, Montavon also worked closely with Puech’s financial advisor, serving as a board member of Freymond’s wealth-management firm, the lawyer testified.
The 2002 agreement, negotiated with Freymond, called for LVMH to buy millions of Hermes shares from Puech and other family heirs, Montavon told prosecutors.
A lawyer for Montavon said his client denied any wrongdoing and that he was never informed “at the time of the events” that LVMH had purchased shares belonging to Puech.
The Swiss lawsuit where LVMH detailed payments to Freymond was filed by the wealth manager in 2016.
Freymond alleged LVMH had not fairly compensated him for his services in helping the company acquire Hermes stock.
LVMH settled the case in 2019, agreeing to pay Freymond 10mil.
In its filing in that case, LVMH detailed the payments to Freymond and said they were intended to maintain its relationship with him and prevent him from facilitating transfers of Hermes shares to competitors.
Freymond had access to Hermes shares because of his relationship with Nicolas Puech and connections to other relatives owning the company’s stock, according to the LVMH filing.
More than 100 heirs from three different family branches own stakes in Hermes, which was founded in 1837.
Many work at the company. Puech had among the largest inherited stakes of any founding-family member.
Reuters could not confirm which heirs, if any, worked with Freymond to sell their shares to LVMH or if they would have known the identity of the buyer.
After Freymond died last year, Hermes family heir and CEO Axel Dumas said he had long been convinced that “Puech doesn’t have his shares anymore”, without elaborating on why.
I’m waiting for the outcome of the criminal investigation,” he said, “but I do not believe these shares can be recovered.”
Freymond’s relationship with LVMH is central to Puech’s lawsuit over his lost fortune and to the criminal investigation.
The relationship started in 2001 after Montavon – the Swiss lawyer now being investigated – helped introduce Freymond to top LVMH aide Pierre Gode, Arnault’s adviser and strategist, according to Montavon’s testimony and the Swiss court submission by LVMH. (Gode died in 2018.)
The LVMH court filing said Freymond claimed connections with Hermes family shareholders interested in selling stock but “did not disclose details about the identity of the seller or sellers”. — Reuters
