Bernard Arnault: The succession drama facing the world's richest man

By Rebecca Armitage for the ABC

Once a month, the world's richest man invites his five children for lunch in a private dining room at the Paris headquarters of his luxury goods empire.

What's on the menu? Their future.

Bernard Arnault is the chief of LVMH, a behemoth valued at $NZ761b, with a dizzying collection of elite brands.

His fashion houses include Dior, Louis Vuitton and Celine, while he owns Moët and Veuve Clicquot champagnes, as well as Hennessy cognac.

Every time you buy yourself a treat from Sephora, a pair of Birkenstocks, or a bottle of Marlborough-based Cloudy Bay sauvignon blanc, your money flows into Arnault's coffers.

The Frenchman's personal wealth is estimated at around $349 billion, making him the wealthiest human on the globe. The world's second-richest person, Elon Musk, is behind him by $90 billion.

But Arnault has a decision to make.

Who among his five adult children - all of whom hold plum roles within LVMH - might one day succeed him?

Despite the monthly lunches with his potential successors, it's believed that Arnault is still no closer to naming a winner.

And those who know "the wolf in cashmere" say he has never ruled out the possibility of going outside the family to choose his heir.

The engineer who loved beautiful things

Bernard Arnault was born to a successful engineer and a mother who had a lifelong "fascination for Dior".

While he initially took over his father's construction and real estate business, Arnault, like his mother, was always drawn to beautiful things.

In 1984, he paid a symbolic one franc for textile company Boussac, which was on the verge of bankruptcy.

Broussac just so happened to own the label Christian Dior.

The French government approved the deal based on a promise from Arnault that he would restore Broussac to its former glory and keep its 8000 employees.

But within five years, he had laid off thousands of workers and sold off almost every asset except for Dior.

From there, he took over LVMH and made his mother's favourite fashion house the jewel in the crown.

"I see myself as an ambassador of French heritage and French culture. What we create is emblematic. It's linked to Versailles, to Marie Antoinette," he said in 2019.

Investment analyst Luca Solca told The Economist that Arnault has made himself rich with a strange paradox: "Selling exclusivity by the million."

Arnaut is said to have a sixth sense when it comes to predicting the next "it bag" that will adorn the wrists of influencers, celebrities and regular people with disposable income.

Whether it's the Dior book tote bag - worth $5200 - or the Loewe basket tote - worth $910 for what is, quite literally, a bag made of straw - Arnault can pick them.

Never ludicrously capacious but always expensive, the bags chosen by Arnault have an "almost magical" power to become status symbols, according to his daughter, Delphine.

"We had this meeting yesterday. He saw a bag and said, 'This one.' He often does that, and I'm always very impressed," she told the Financial Times in 2014.

It's for this reason that Arnault has for decades been fixated on acquiring Hermès for his stable of fine leather goods.

Hermès bags - particularly the Birkin and the Kelly - cost between $10,000 and $250,000. But you cannot simply walk into an Hermès store and ask to purchase one.

You have to build a relationship with the brand over months or years, dropping cash on other items, until finally, a sales rep will invite you into the most exclusive fashion club in the world.

The bags are not just fashion. They are also considered solid investments, often outperforming gold and the stock market.

But despite his repeated overtures and tactics - including stealthily buying 20 percent of Hermès's stock - the company rebuffed his takeover bid in 2011.

Then-chief executive Patrick Thomas said Arnault's ruthless pursuit of wealth was everything Hermès was not.

"There is a part of our world that is playing on abundance, on glitz and glamour. And there is another part that is concentrated on refinement, basically making beautiful objects," he said.

"We don't want to be a part of this financial world which is ruining companies and dealing with people like they are goods or raw materials."

It's been more than a decade since his failed bid, but Arnault's allies say that doesn't mean he's given up.

"Arnault would buy Hermès tomorrow if he could," an LVMH source told The Guardian.

"Otherwise, he will wait it out, even if it takes a generation or two. That's what he's like."

If Hermès is to be conquered by the next generation, Arnault wants a say in who will lead LVMH into battle.

Delphine and Antoine

At his monthly lunches with his children, Arnault reportedly goes around the table asking everyone for their advice on business matters, as well as their opinions on specific LVMH employees.

The meals are believed to be part of a decades-long process for Arnault to decide if his successor is among his progeny, who range in age from 48 to 24.

But he has still left himself room to choose an outsider if he deems his children unsuitable for the role.

"At no moment did he tell me, 'I must prepare my children for my succession'," Sidney Toledano, the LVMH Group chairman, told The Wall Street Journal.

When Arnault made his eldest daughter, Delphine, the chief executive officer of Dior in January, many took that as an endorsement.

Both father and daughter embrace the so-called "stealth wealth" aesthetic in the form of monochromatic, tailored pieces - usually from Dior - and they often attend fashion shows together.

But analysts say her younger brother Antoine should not be discounted.

The 45-year-old, who is married to Russian supermodel Natalia Vodianova, is credited with making Louis Vuitton cool again.

In 2013, he oversaw a highly acclaimed advertising campaign that saw everyone from ex-Soviet chairman Mikhail Gorbachev to rock star Keith Richards endorse the brand.

There was a time when Delphine and Antoine believed the question of succession would be decided between the two of them.

But their father's second marriage added three other potential heirs to the race.

Alexandre, Frédéric and Jean

Arnault divorced Delphine and Antoine's mother in 1990 and married Canadian classical pianist Hélène Mercier.

Their three sons might have an edge over their half-siblings because they went to engineering schools - something that is deeply important to Arnault.

While the baby of the family, Jean, 24, went to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, his brother Alexandre, 30, and Frédéric, 28 attended École Polytechnique, their father's beloved alma mater.

Arnault credits the prestigious engineering university in Paris with sharpening his business acumen and killer instinct.

"For him, only Polytechnique counts," Antoine, a business school graduate, once said to Le Monde.

The three youngest Arnaults have also infused LVMH with some Gen Z cachet.

Frédéric is the chief executive of watchmaker TAG Heuer, while Jean has launched a watch collection with Louis Vuitton.

Alexandre became RIMOWA's chief executive at the age of 23, transforming the niche luggage line into a buzzy brand by partnering with streetwear labels including Off-White.

A completely transparent suitcase designed by Virgil Ablo sold for $2500 when it was released, and has only appreciated on the resale market.

Alexandre is also responsible for the reinvention of Tiffany & Co, bringing Jay Z and Beyonce as spokesmodels.

"[Tiffany] was - at the beginning of the 80s - at the top of its game, then it more or less stagnated starting at the beginning of the 2000s," Bernard said last year of his son's new venture.

"It had become a sleeping beauty."

While you might think that vying for their father's favour would cause tension between the siblings, Toledano insists they're all professionals who put the future of LVMH ahead of personal ambition.

"For now, they all get on great," he said.

Who will inherit the empire?

Arnault has cleverly set up his business to prevent his children from turning against each other.

In 2022, he changed the legal structure of his family holding company Agache to ensure the Arnaults will continue to control LVMH for years to come.

But he also set up a second company called Agache Commandité SAS, in which each of his children holds an equal 20 percent stake.

This second entity could theoretically take over Agache and topple Arnault from his throne.

But there's a catch: The children can only do so if they're in unanimous agreement.

They are also bound to keep their shares for 30 years, unless they all agree to release a sibling from the family empire.

Even with the possibility of a global recession looming, LVMH's economic future looks bright.

In 2022, the company delivered a second straight year of record sales and profits.

"We work on our brand desirability so they can resist in downturns," LVMH's finance director Jean Jacques Guiony said in January.

But within France, LVMH has an image problem.

When the French government tried to raise the minimum pension age from 62 to 64, huge demonstrations broke out across the country.

Last month, protesters briefly stormed the Paris HQ of LVMH, setting off flares inside the building.

"You're looking for money to finance pensions? Take it from the pockets of billionaires," Sud Rail trade unionist Fabien Villedieu told Reuters.

Eldest son Antoine has reportedly encouraged his father to shift public perception of LVMH with an ad campaign that spruiks the company as a French taxpayer and job creator.

But Arnault is not quite ready to hand over control just yet.

Last year, the 74-year-old asked LVMH shareholders to raise the age limit for a serving chief executive from 75 to 80.

They voted in his favour.

"As to succession, you may also have noticed that the retirement age - which is very much in vogue - has been extended," he said.

And so the Arnault children are bracing for another six years of monthly lunches while their father decides who among them will inherit the empire.

- ABC