>>> What to look at today - 23rd of June 2021

Most Asian stocks rose with U.S. equity futures Wednesday after reassuring comments on inflation and monetary policy from Federal Reserve officials bolstered investor sentiment. Treasury yields held declines.
Technology shares helped MSCI Inc.’s Asia-Pacific index climb for a second day, though Japanese equities edged back. European futures fluctuated and U.S. equity contracts advanced after both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 posted gains.
Overnight, Fed Chair Jerome Powell reiterated his view that inflation pressures will be transitory even after a notable increase in recent months. He added the Fed would be patient in waiting to lift borrowing costs. The dollar strengthened.
The currencies of Australia and New Zealand retreated on stepped up coronavirus curbs. Sydney will impose new restrictions to fight the Delta variant, while Wellington will move to a higher alert level.
US After Hours Quiet after hours; GMTX -36% falls on clinical data; SCR +6.3% as Canada passes bill to allow for single-game wagering; SHAK +1.2% to open more locations in China

Nikkei -0.02% Hang Seng +1.43% CSI +0.89% Shanghai +0.46% Shenzen +0.95%

Eur$ 1.1919 CNH 6.4875 CNY 6.4815 JPY 110.82 GBP 1.3928 CHF 0.9197 RUB 72.8656 TRY 8.6612 WTI$ 73.20 +0.48% Gold 1,780.47 +0.10% BTC 33,850 +1300 ETH 2000 +85

S&P +0.24% Nasdaq +0.25% EuroStoxx -0.10% FTSE -0.02% Dax +0.03% SMI

Macro :
- EVs Seen Reaching Sales Supremacy by 2033, Faster Than Expected
- Spain to Lower Value-Added Tax Rate on Electricity, RTVE Says

Keep an eye on :
- ANA SM : Acciona Energia IPO Order Book Covered on Total Deal Size: Terms
- ADVIC FP : Advicenne SACA Offers EU10m Shares via Gilbert Dupont
- AZN LN : *JAPAN TO APPROVE ASTRAZENECA VACCINE FOR PUBLIC USE: NIKKEI
- BAB LN : Babcock to Lead U.K. Program Supplying Warships to Ukraine
- BP/ LN : Clean Energy Fuels Contributed $50M to BP Joint Venture June 21
- BNR GY : Brenntag to Buy JM Swank for $304 Million Enterprise Value
- DWNI GY : Vonovia Starts Public Takeover Offer for Deutsche Wohnen
- EDF FP : EDF Proposes Fix to Keep Flamanville EPR on Schedule: Echos
- ENI IM : Eni CEO Says Slated Angolan JV With BP Good Tool to De-Leverage
- EXPN LN : Experian Introduces Hybrid Working Model for U.K. Employees
- HCM LN : *HUTCHMED (CHINA) IS SAID POISED TO RAISE $537M IN H.K. LISTING
- HEIA NA : Heineken Buys Additional 39.6 Million Shares in United Breweries
- MMK AV : Mayr Melnhof to Sell German, Dutch Cartonboard Mills to Oaktree
- MPCC NO : MPC Container Ships to Buy Songa Container for $210.25m
- KN FP : Natixis to Be Excluded From Euronext Indexes
- RI FP : Pernod Ricard Boosts FY Recurring Ops Profit Organic Growth View
- PHNX LN : Swiss Re Sells Phoenix Group Stake of About 6.6% for GBP437M
- ROVI SM : Norbel Offers up to 1.68M Rovi Shares in Private Placement, Rovi Shares Placed at EU52.25/Shr
- RTL LX : RTL Group, Talpa Network Agree to Merge Broadcasting Operations
- SANN SW : Santhera Phase 4 LEROS Trial with Raxone Meets Primary Endpoint
- SGSN SW : SGS Has Means for Acquisitions and Dividends, CEO Tells FuW
- SINCH SS : Nasdaq: Sinch to Replace Securitas in OMX Stockholm 30 Index
- Smarcraft IPO : Smartcraft IPO Prices at NOK17.80/Share
- SREN SW : Swiss Re Sells Phoenix Group Stake of About 6.6% for GBP437M
- DG FP : Vinci JV Awarded GBP114m Contract for Cancer Research Center
- VNA GY : Vonovia Launches Offer for Rival German Landlord Deutsche Wohnen
- VOW GY : VW CEO Sees Autonomy Transforming Cars More Than Electrification
- WIZZ LN : Wizz Air CEO Sees Italian Fleet Doubling Over Next Three Years

WSJ : China to Keep Covid-19 Border Restrictions for Another Year

China to Keep Covid-19 Border Restrictions for Another Year
Beijing worries about variants as it stages the Olympics and a power transition

Beijing is planning to keep its pandemic border restrictions in place for at least another year as officials fret over the emergence of new variants and a calendar of sensitive events, according to people familiar with the matter, despite a coronavirus vaccination campaign that has topped one billion doses.

The provisional timeline of the second half of 2022 was set during a mid-May meeting of the country’s cabinet, or State Council, attended by officials from China’s Foreign Ministry and National Health Commission, among other government bodies, one of the people said.

The cautious attitude is being driven by a pair of events that officials are eager to have go off without a hitch next year: the Winter Olympics in February and a once-a-decade power transition within the ruling Chinese Communist Party toward the end of the year. At the Communist Party Congress, Chinese leader Xi Jinping is widely expected to seek an additional term beyond the customary two-term limit.

By largely restricting new visas to those who have received a Chinese vaccine and maintaining requirements for an enforced hotel quarantine of at least 14 days upon arrival, Chinese officials have sought to neutralize risks from imported cases, the people said.

After the coronavirus first exploded in the central city of Wuhan last year, Chinese authorities initially condemned countries such as the U.S. that imposed restrictions on travel to and from China.

But as China contained the virus inside its borders and the situation worsened abroad, Beijing has been among the most fastidious in maintaining border controls. The country aggressively smothers outbreaks as they appear through a combination of targeted lockdowns, mass testing and centralized quarantines.

In recent weeks, China has ramped up its initially sluggish vaccination campaign. On Sunday, authorities said it had surpassed one billion shots. As of June 10, Our World in Data said that 16% of the country’s population had been fully vaccinated.

Vaccinations will likely slow to roughly 10 million doses a day by early August, from a peak of 20 million doses in early June, as the shots reach more remote places. By December, 80% of China’s population will have received at least one dose, Goldman Sachs economists told clients in a June 6 note.

If China does ease restrictions, it is likely to first be on travel between the mainland and Hong Kong and Macau, the two special administrative regions that border the southern Chinese province of Guangdong, according to the people.

Hong Kong and Macau have enjoyed several weeks without any local infections, though Guangdong has been battling a wave of cases for the past month, making any near-term lifting of restrictions unlikely.

China would then relax requirements on countries with high vaccination rates and that have brought infection numbers under control, according to the people. Countries that recognize Chinese vaccines will most likely be considered first, the people said, adding that there is no timeline for loosening.

China’s Foreign Ministry said in response to questions that it is willing to maintain communication with all parties and engage in safe and orderly travel, while ensuring disease prevention.

China hasn’t approved any Western vaccines listed by the World Health Organization for emergency use, though The Wall Street Journal reported in April that Beijing is planning to approve the vaccine developed by Germany’s BioNTech SE by July. U.S. regulators haven’t approved any Chinese vaccines.

Earlier this month, Feng Zijian, the former deputy head of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said at a conference that the timing of any shift from a zero Covid-19 strategy to one with more open borders would largely depend on a high vaccination rate and a consensus about whether some deaths are acceptable to the broader society.

Countries such as Britain and Chile boast some of the highest vaccination rates in the world but are still battling infection surges largely among the unvaccinated population, delaying plans to ease lockdowns.

In addition, clinical data indicate that Chinese vaccines, while able to protect against severe cases and hospitalization, are less effective at cutting transmission.

“This could allow the virus to still replicate, leading to outbreaks among the unvaccinated population or mutations against which the current vaccines are not effective,” said Jin Dong-Yan, a professor of molecular virology at the University of Hong Kong.

Chinese health officials have said that China-developed vaccines have proven effective against the current variants, including the more infectious Delta variant first detected in India. They said that while fully vaccinated people had been infected, they hadn’t become seriously ill and that the shots are being tested against the new strains.

The Chinese CDC has said it is studying the effectiveness of extra doses, including booster shots with its domestically developed vaccines as well as BioNTech’s, which uses a different technology, according to a person familiar with the matter.

China isn’t the only country that is waiting to open borders. In May, Australia said it would tentatively begin the process in mid-2022.

The organizers of the Beijing Olympics, which are set to begin Feb. 4, haven’t said whether foreign spectators will be allowed into the country. Organizers of next month’s Summer Games in Tokyo are allowing Japanese spectators and turning away foreigners.

While China’s tight border controls have fended off the virus, enabling the domestic economy to recover, “The reality of continued outbreaks and lingering restrictions does place a ceiling on how far that recovery can go,” said Cui Ernan, an analyst at research firm Gavekal Dragonomics.

It will also mean that international businesses in China will have had to operate in an impaired manner for more than a year, with foreign executives stranded offshore and face-to-face meetings virtually impossible, said Alan Beebe, president of the American Chamber of Commerce in China.

>>> US Close Dow +0.20% S&P +0.51% Nasdaq +0.79% Russell +0.43%

Closing Stock Market Summary

The S&P 500 gained 0.5% on Tuesday in a session that featured leadership from the growth stocks and a congressional testimony from Fed Chair Powell. The Nasdaq Composite (+0.8%) outperformed and set intraday and closing record highs. The Dow Jones Industrial Average increased 0.2%, and the Russell 2000 increased 0.4%. 

Before the Fed Chair spoke to the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis in the afternoon, the S&P 500 was sporting a slightly positive bias and was leaning heavily on the growth stocks. The latter obfuscated the fact that declining issues were outpacing advancing issues at the both the NYSE and Nasdaq. 

Fed Chair Powell didn't really provide any new information on monetary policy and instead spoke optimistically about the economic outlook. He said that factors that have weighed on the labor market and that have contributed to increased levels of inflation should both be transitory. In addition, Mr. Powell said he thinks there will be strong jobs creation this fall.

The broader market firmed up a little bit, particularly the small-cap stocks as the Russell 2000 was down 0.9% shortly after the open. The consumer discretionary sector (+1.0%) finished atop the S&P 500 sector standings with a 1% gain, while the utilities (-0.7%) and real estate (-0.4%) sectors were the only sectors that closed lower.

The consumer discretionary sector included a nice gain in Amazon.com (AMZN 3505.44, +51.48, +1.5%), which reportedly had a decent first day of its Prime Day event. All in all, it was still a session heavily influenced by large growth stocks like Amazon.

Apple (AAPL 133.98, +1.68, +1.3%), Microsoft (MSFT 265.51, +2.88, +1.1%), Facebook (FB 339.03, +6.74, +2.0%), and NVIDIA (NVDA 755.47, +18.38, +2.5%) rose more than 1.0%. The Vanguard Mega Cap Growth ETF (MGK 227.92, +2.34, +1.0%) increased 1.0%. 

U.S. Treasuries settled slightly higher, pushing yields lower. The 2-yr yield decreased two basis points to 0.23%, and the 10-yr yield decreased one basis point to 1.47%. The U.S. Dollar Index decreased 0.2% to 91.73. WTI crude futures decreased 0.8%, or $0.56, to $73.08/bbl. 

Reviewing Tuesday's economic data:

  • Existing home sales decreased 0.9% m/m in May to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.80 million (consensus 5.71 million) from an unrevised 5.85 million in April. Total sales in May were up 44.6% from a year ago when they were depressed in the early stages of the pandemic.
    • The key takeaway from the report is that the supply of existing homes for sale remains extremely limited. That is driving up the pace of price increases well beyond the pace of income gains, which is going to create affordability pressures for prospective buyers, particularly first-time buyers.

Looking ahead, investors will receive New Home Sales for May, the Current Account Balance for the first quarter, preliminary IHS Markit Manufacturing and Services PMIs for June, and the weekly MBA Mortgage Applications Index on Wednesday. 

  • Russell 2000 +16.3% YTD
  • S&P 500 +13.1% YTD
  • Dow Jones Industrial Average +10.9% YTD
  • Nasdaq Composite +10.6% YTD

>>> US After Hours Summary: Quiet after hours; GMTX -36% falls on clinical data;

After Hours Summary: Quiet after hours; GMTX -36% falls on clinical data; SCR +6.3% as Canada passes bill to allow for single-game wagering; SHAK +1.2% to open more locations in China

After Hours Gainers:

Companies trading higher in after hours in reaction to earnings/guidance: None

Companies trading higher in after hours in reaction to news: SCR +6.3% (Canada passes bill to allow for single-game wagering), CDR +5.2% (closes on sale of shopping ctr for $89.7 mln), CLNE +1.8% (forces conversion of BP's Class B Units into Class A Units relating to joint venture), BTBT +1.4% (Wise Gain Inv discloses 12.28% stake), SHAK +1.2% (to open 10 new Shacks in territories in China by 2031), VAL +1.2% (wins contract with North Oil Company offshore Qatar), NTNX +1% (names new board chair), DKNG +0.7% (Canada passes bill to allow for single-game wagering), MCK +0.3% (exploring sale of European, U.K. business arms, according to Bloomberg), FSR +0.3% (MGA discloses 7.4% stake in FSR related to vested warrants), INTC +0.1% (adds technology leaders to its executive leadership team; also creates two new business units), DMTK +0.1% (announces collaboration with researchers), BIIB +0.1% (FDA approved co's Alzheimer's drug over the objection of agency statisticians, according to WSJ)

After Hours Losers:

Companies trading lower in after hours in reaction to earnings/guidance: None

Companies trading lower in after hours in reaction to news: GMTX -36% (reports initial data from Phase 2a study of GEM103), EYES -16.2% (stock offering), BTAI -7.7% (stock offering), CTT -1.9% (selling 18,063 acres of Oregon timberlands for $100 mln), SMED -1% (files for $35 mln mixed securities shelf offering), NKLA -0.3% (to invest $50 mln in Wabash Valley Resources), SOLO -0.2% (files for $750 mln mixed securities shelf offering), CIM -0.1% (CFO departs)

FT : Britain prepares for new wave of nuclear decommissioning

Britain prepares for new wave of nuclear decommissioning
Sceptics of the fuel argue the plans demonstrate why no new plants should be built

At Dungeness B nuclear power station on a remote stretch of the Kent coast in south-east England, workers are making preparations to carefully remove thousands of radioactive fuel elements from its reactors and transfer them to a purpose-built pond for at least 90 days for cooling.

The spent fuel will later be packed into 53-tonne “flasks” fortified with 39cm-thick steel walls before being transported across country by train to Sellafield in Cumbria.

The nuclear facility in north-west England is host to most of the radioactive remnants of Britain’s civil nuclear programme that dates back to the 1950s. These include highly toxic waste that will remain there until a suitable site is found for an underground repository where it will have to be stored for more than 100,000 years to make it safe.

Preparations for the “defuelling” of Dungeness B started with “immediate effect” on June 7 when its majority owner, French state-controlled utility EDF, announced it would close the plant seven years early. It had not been operational since September 2018 as engineers tried to fix problems, including corrosion and cracks in its pipework.

The 1.1GW plant is the first of seven built in the UK between the mid-1960s and late-1980s using advanced gas-cooled reactor (AGR) technology to come out of service. It will kickstart a decommissioning process spanning generations, which sceptics argue strikes at the heart of why no new nuclear plants should be built.

The remaining six AGR plants are due to be retired by the end of this decade at the latest, leaving the more modern Sizewell B plant in Suffolk, which uses pressurised water reactor technology, as the only one operational out of the existing fleet.

“[Decommissioning of] many of these facilities will continue well into the 22nd century,” said Paul Dorfman of University College London’s Energy Institute. “The problem with decommissioning is it always turns out to be more complex than one had imagined.”


Critics also point out that the decommissioning of Britain’s 17 earliest atomic power sites has been extremely costly. The latest clean-up bill for those sites, which include a generation of nuclear plants known as the “Magnox” stations, is estimated at more than £130bn over 120 years.

Nuclear supporters have seized upon the retirement of the first AGR to highlight that the UK is fast running out of a vital source of low carbon electricity that — unlike the main renewables, wind and solar — is available throughout the year, no matter the weather. The UK has committed to net-zero carbon emission targets by 2050.

Five of the AGR plants are due to be shut down in the next three years, removing more than 5.2GW of the current 8.9GW of nuclear energy capacity, which accounts for just under a fifth of total UK generating capacity.

Only one new plant is under construction, the 3.2GW Hinkley Point C in Somerset, which will be able to provide electricity for 6m homes when it is completed by EDF.

It is due to open in 2026 but has been troubled by spiralling costs and delays. Reports last week of a possible radiation leak at a plant in China, which is based on the same Franco-German reactor technology as that at Hinkley, have heightened concerns among opponents of nuclear power.

Proponents are pushing ministers to make progress in negotiations with EDF about financing a second new station — Sizewell C in Suffolk — which have been ongoing since December. 

Tom Greatrex, chief executive of the Nuclear Industry Association, insisted without new nuclear capacity, the electricity system would become more reliant on carbon-intensive, gas-fired power stations — the UK’s single biggest source of electricity — during dark winter days when there is no wind.

“The quid pro quo that you get with [a] system where there is a quite a lot of variable output [from wind and solar] is you get the other extreme of that at other points in the year,” Greatrex said.

Climate activists, such as E3G and Greenpeace, have long argued that the debate over building costly, complex new nuclear plants detracts from investment in cheaper, climate-friendly technologies.

The government said it was “committed to the future of nuclear energy”. It indicated it was looking to make a final decision on “at least one nuclear power station” before the next general election.

The exact arrangements for the decommissioning of Dungeness and the six other AGR plants are subject to negotiation between EDF and the government. It will be financed via a £14.5bn fund set up in 2005.

The French utility is expected to take at least three years to remove all fuel from each site and potentially carry out some early demolition work before handing them over to the UK state-owned Nuclear Decommissioning Authority. EDF declined to comment.

The next stage will probably involve the treatment and removal of waste and demolition of facilities that are no longer needed. Some facilities will be left untouched for 85 years — to allow residual radioactive materials to decay — before demolition.

The NDA is already in charge of decommissioning Britain’s earliest nuclear sites including Sellafield, where the world’s first civil atomic plant Calder Hall was opened in 1956. But it has faced criticism in recent years by MPs, who claim there is a “perpetual lack of knowledge” within the agency about the state of the sites, an accusation it refuted.

Engineers insist decommissioning of the AGRs will be far less complex and costly, given most of the £130bn bill for the earlier sites will be spent on Sellafield. The facility in Cumbria is one of the biggest nuclear sites in the world.

Dawn James, vice-president for nuclear power at Jacobs, the engineering group, said lessons learned from cleaning up the earliest nuclear power facilities would make the next decommissioning wave more efficient.

“[With] the AGRs we have got a lot of learning from that end-of-life process that the Magnox stations went through,” she said.

FT : Illimity: new Italian bank promises lending renaissance

Illimity: new Italian bank promises lending renaissance
Smaller, more specialised lending breathes new life to a sector many wrote off as a dead end

Italian banks have spent more than a decade trying to clean up dud loans. The pandemic has loaded more on to the pile. For self-proclaimed “new paradigm” bank Illimity, however, this presents an opportunity.

Illimity aims to combine the clean-up with new lending, by servicing bad debts and offering small business loans. The bank unveiled ambitious growth plans on Tuesday to double profits and target returns on equity of 20 per cent by 2025.

Founder and chief executive Corrado Passera, former boss at Intesa Sanpaolo, claims tech enables the bank to target assets that other lenders shy away from. In Italy, there are plenty to choose from.

Shares up almost two-thirds since its listing in 2019 reflects faith in the bank’s ability to select the right sort of bad debts. These fall into two buckets: underperforming or unable to pay and non-performing or distressed. Illimity targets growth of €1.3bn from the €35bn of expected underperforming debts that the wider Italian banking system will generate over the next five years. These are businesses that it hopes will recover and will then require corporate financing services afterwards.

Distressed credit services present an even bigger opportunity. It has already been buying up portfolios of distressed debts. Assets booked on the balance sheet as of the first quarter were €1.7bn, representing nominal debts of almost €9bn. Additional distressed debts with a nominal value of €180bn are expected to be generated over the next five years, of which Illimity hopes to buy up about €3bn of net new exposures.

Technology deals add to core banking profits. A deal with privately owned financial data company ION, also announced on Tuesday, will add €90m to revenues by 2025. As part of the deal, ION will take a 10 per cent equity stake in the bank.

Returns on equity this year should reach 10 per cent — almost double last year’s result. So far, Illimity has delivered as promised. That justifies its shares’ rich valuation of 1.3 times tangible book. Smaller and more specialised lending is breathing new life to a sector many wrote off as a dead end.

WWD : Bernard Arnault Talks La Samaritaine, Tourism and Breakfast on the Seine

Bernard Arnault Talks La Samaritaine, Tourism and Breakfast on the Seine
In an interview with WWD, LVMH CEO Bernard Arnault sets out his ambitions for La Samaritaine after 16 years of renovations.

By Joelle Diderich on June 21, 2021
Bernard Arnault.
Kuba Dabrowski

PARIS — After opening a Louis Vuitton leather goods workshop in Texas in 2019 with then-President Donald Trump, luxury mogul Bernard Arnault secured another G7 leader for the opening of the renovated La Samaritaine department store in Paris: none other than French President Emmanuel Macron.
The two men, accompanied by First Lady Brigitte Macron and Arnault’s wife Hélène Mercier-Arnault, spent almost an hour on Monday touring the department store, which is due to open to the public on June 23 after a 16-year renovation process.
“The reopening of the Samaritaine today is also an event [that] we hope marks the end of this tragic period,” Arnault said in a speech before Macron and 700 members of staff, dressed in the store’s uniform of blue suits, striped T-shirts and white sneakers with laces in the retailer’s signature yellow hue.

Afterward, Arnault stopped for lunch at Voyage, the restaurant under the gold-hued peacock mural on the fifth floor of the Art Nouveau building. Over caviar and sushi, he recounted that, during the visit, Macron bumped into his niece, who happens to work at the department store. “Emmanuel didn’t know,” he chuckled.
In an interview with WWD, the chairman and chief executive officer of LVMH discussed his ambitions for La Samaritaine, the fallout of the coronavirus pandemic on tourism and why, despite the challenges, he was never tempted to give up on the project.


WWD: What does the fact that President Emmanuel Macron attended the inauguration say about the importance of this project in the eyes of the French government?
Bernard Arnault: This reopening is symbolic on three counts. La Samaritaine is a powerful symbol of French know-how: architectural know-how, with this exceptional building that is a historical monument located right in the heart of Paris. The neighboring Art Deco building, which used to be part of La Samaritaine and is now a Cheval Blanc hotel, is also a noteworthy building, and then there is the new building we designed with [architect] Kazuyo Sejima on Rue de Rivoli. So I think, in purely architectural terms, this is an event in itself.
Then there is the whole artistic dimension. We just walked past this peacock mural which is the largest existing monumental Art Nouveau painting in the world, an exceptional work of art that was painted by the son of architect Frantz Jourdain and which is a historical monument in itself.
Lastly, there’s the fact that we are bringing to the center of Paris today 3,000 jobs between La Samaritaine, the Cheval Blanc hotel and the group’s offices, which will be located in the modern building. I think that also explains the president’s interest in this project, which marks the reopening of the economy after a period of intense crisis in France and the rest of the world over the last 18 months. It partly accounts for why the president came to cheer the opening. You saw how enthusiastically he was greeted by our teams, who gave him an ovation on every floor. I can tell you that I’ve seen several presidents visit our facilities, and I’ve never seen as much enthusiasm for any president as our teams showed for President Macron.
WWD: Looking ahead beyond this period, what do you hope this project will contribute to the economic and cultural development of this rapidly evolving area of central Paris?


B.A.: We want to make La Samaritaine a model department store with a mix of products and brands, but also the notion of pleasure, like having lunch here in this exceptional environment. A view like this in Paris is quite remarkable. So it’s a destination that goes beyond mere commerce.
The same is true of the Cheval Blanc hotel. You have to visit the rooms. It’s incredible, because in every room there’s a little alcove where you can have breakfast overlooking the Seine, and you feel like you’re having your breakfast on the river. There’s not a single noise, not even traffic. It’s terrific, and the architecture and interior design are quite magnificent.
WWD: The whole process took 16 years. Were you ever tempted to throw in the towel?
B.A.: Frankly, no, because I’m not in the habit of giving up and it’s not in the DNA of the LVMH group. We think long-term and even if it was very difficult, even if there were times when people felt a little discouraged, I always stayed the course, because I was convinced that fundamentally, it was impossible for a city like Paris and a state like France not to let us renovate such a beautiful building, not to let us reopen it, especially in this location. It occupies one of the most beautiful spots in Paris, between the Louvre museum, which you can see from here, and the Pompidou museum, which is within walking distance. So I was always confident we would prevail. Having said that, as I mentioned in my speech, this job could only be done by a group that thinks like we do: a family-run group that thinks long-term and that can afford to invest in a project for 15 years with no turnover and no profit. I think we’re the only ones in France capable of doing this.
WWD: Tourism is the lifeblood of DFS. What is the outlook for your travel retail division this year, and when do you expect tourists to return to Paris?
B.A.: In the short term, there are very few tourists, not just in Paris but in many parts of the world. The situation is a consequence of the crisis. The question is not whether things will return to normal or not. Clearly, they will return to normal. The question is when? Will it take six months, a year or 18 months? It’s impossible to say, because it will depend on the evolution of measures to control the virus in the various countries concerned. For example, when will French people be allowed to travel to the United States as they did in the past? For the time being, it’s still very difficult. Some say it will be on July 4, others say it will be later. We don’t know, and everything depends on that. But we’ve waited 15 years, an extra year won’t make much difference.


WWD: How many visitors a year do you expect when the situation normalizes?
B.A.: I don’t have a figure off the top of my head, but I would expect it to be similar to other Paris department stores and we hope even better, given that it’s new and extremely well located. I think every tourist goes to the Louvre and it’s within walking distance. It’s 50 yards away.
WWD: But you’re much smaller than say, Galeries Lafayette. Doesn’t that limit capacity?
B.A.: No, it’s an advantage being small. It’s not good to be too big. If you’re too big, you have lots and lots of space to fill. We focus on the essential.
WWD: You were speaking earlier with Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo, who has banned cars on the banks on the Seine and on Rue de Rivoli, and has plans to go further by creating a restricted traffic zone in central Paris. Is this policy harmful for your business?
B.A.: I think City Hall, and the mayor in particular, are very sensitive to the fact that bringing 3,000 jobs to this area of Paris demonstrates that she does not want to transform the city of Paris into a museum, and that she will be sensitive to the fact that we have to give this economic development the means to be competitive. She assured me that we would not be economically disadvantaged with regard to our competitors, which are the other Paris department stores. She gave me her word and I trust her implicitly.