FT : Christine Lagarde to leave ECB before the end of her 8-year term

Christine Lagarde to leave ECB before the end of her 8-year term
Central banker wants to give Emmanuel Macron and Friedrich Merz the chance to pick her successor

Christine Lagarde is expected to leave the European Central Bank before her eight-year term as president expires in October 2027, according to a person familiar with her thinking.

Europe’s top central banker, who joined the Frankfurt-based ECB in November 2019 from the IMF, wants to exit before the French presidential election in April next year.

According to the person with knowledge of her thinking, Lagarde wants to enable outgoing French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz to find a new head for one of the EU’s most important institutions. It is not yet clear when Lagarde’s departure will take place.

The ECB declined to comment.

European economists polled by the FT in December regarded Spain’s former central bank governor Pablo Hernández de Cos and his Dutch counterpart Klaas Knot as top picks to become the next president of the Eurozone central bank. ECB executive board member Isabel Schnabel has said she is interested in the job, and people briefed on Bundesbank president Joachim Nagel’s thinking said he was also keen on the role.

People briefed on discussions in Paris have told the FT that Macron — who cannot run for a third term as French president — has for months wanted a say in choosing Lagarde’s successor.

The French presidential election in April next year will be crucial for the Eurozone’s second-largest economy and the wider EU.

Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-right Rassemblement Nationale, is consistently polling ahead of rivals, putting her in pole position to make the run-off between two candidates in the final presidential ballot.

While Le Pen may be disqualified from running as the RN candidate after being convicted last year of embezzling European parliament funds, she has said her protégé Jordan Bardella would step in in these circumstances. 

Both Le Pen, who is appealing against her conviction, and Bardella are Eurosceptics, which could complicate relations with European institutions such as the ECB.

Lagarde’s time at the ECB’s helm has been shaped by a series of crises, including the Covid-19 pandemic, Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and a trade conflict with the US.

Under her watch, Eurozone inflation surged to close to 11 per cent in late 2022, as energy prices shot up in the wake of Russia’s attack on its neighbour and global supply chains suffered pandemic-related bottlenecks.

The ECB raised interest rates from minus 0.5 per cent to 4 per cent in little more than a year.

From mid-2024, the central bank lowered borrowing costs to 2 per cent as inflation fell back to the ECB’s 2 per cent medium-term target.  

Lagarde’s appointment as ECB president came after Macron and then German chancellor Angela Merkel struck a surprise deal in 2019.

They agreed that Lagarde take over the ECB and then German defence minister Ursula von der Leyen become European Commission president.

Lagarde told Bloomberg TV last month that she accepted the ECB job under the impression that she would serve a five-year term, in comments seen by observers as potential preparation for an early exit.

She recalled how she told Macron after agreeing to the role of ECB president: “I’ll be in Frankfurt for five years. And at that point Macron said ‘No, for eight years’.”

In the summer of last year, an ECB spokesperson stressed that Lagarde “is determined to complete her [eight-year] term” after former World Economic Forum chair Klaus Schwab said the central bank president had discussed a potential early exit to take over leadership of the WEF.

“I regret to tell you that you’re not about to see the back of me,” Lagarde told reporters at the ECB headquarters last June. 

FT : British scientist raising $1bn for new AI lab in Europe’s biggest seed roun

British scientist raising $1bn for new AI lab in Europe’s biggest seed round
Sequoia Capital leading funding deal for David Silver’s start-up Ineffable Intelligence at $4bn valuation

David Silver, one of Britain’s top AI researchers, is raising $1bn for a new company aiming to build “superhuman intelligence” in a deal led by Sequoia Capital that would be the largest seed round ever in Europe.

The round is expected to value the nascent start-up at about $4bn, not including the new investment, according to people with knowledge of the matter. It comes amid a rush to back prominent researchers leaving big AI labs to work on experimental technologies.

Silver left Google DeepMind late last year to launch the London-based start-up, named Ineffable Intelligence.

His departure from DeepMind kicked off a highly competitive process to back his new venture, with Sequoia managing partner Alfred Lin and partner Sonya Huang flying to London to visit Silver, who is also a professor at University College London.

Big Tech groups including Nvidia, Google and Microsoft are also in talks to invest, the people said, adding that negotiations are live and the final terms could change. If concluded at $1bn, it would be the largest first round ever raised by a European start-up, according to PitchBook.

Top researchers have raised unprecedented sums for untested start-ups promising to build AI that will outperform large language models from OpenAI, Google or Anthropic.

Such is the flurry of activity that last month two separate start-ups, Ricursive Intelligence and Recursive AI, both undertook funding talks with a price tag of $4bn, according to people familiar with those deals.

Ineffable Intelligence will build on Silver’s work training AI systems through human feedback or interactions with their environment — a process known as reinforcement learning. Most leading AI models are trained on large volumes of text culled from the internet, before being fine-tuned via feedback.

In a paper on the “Era of Experience”, published last year, Silver and Canadian computer scientist Richard Sutton predicted that a “new generation of agents will acquire superhuman capabilities by learning predominantly from experience”.

AI agents capable of independently completing complex tasks based on human instructions are increasingly regarded as the key to advancing and commercialising AI by large labs and start-ups alike.

Experience will “become the dominant medium of improvement and ultimately dwarf the scale of human data used in today’s systems”, Silver and Sutton predicted.

Silver joined DeepMind soon after it was founded in 2010 and has been behind some of the AI group’s landmark breakthroughs. He worked closely on AlphaGo and AlphaStar, AI programmes capable of beating the world’s best players of the strategy game Go and the video game StarCraft.

He has also been instrumental in developing Google’s Gemini family of LLMs, after the Big Tech company bought DeepMind in 2014.

The 49-year-old is one of a number of prominent researchers in the field who have formed their own companies in recent months.

OpenAI executives Ilya Sutskever and Mira Murati have raised billions since leaving the ChatGPT maker in 2024; Arthur Mensch left Google DeepMind in 2023 to start French start-up Mistral and raised €105mn in a seed funding round that year.

Meta’s chief AI scientist Yann LeCun left last year to launch his own project, AMI Labs, and is in talks to raise about €500mn at a €3bn valuation. A group of xAI co-founders and early employees last week claimed they were leaving Elon Musk’s company to focus on their own project.

Half of the $469bn invested by venture capitalists globally last year went to AI groups, according to CB Insights.

Ineffable Intelligence, Sequoia, Microsoft and Nvidia declined to comment. Google did not immediately respond.

FT : German drone maker Stark faces political backlash over Peter Thiel links

German drone maker Stark faces political backlash over Peter Thiel links
Defence minister calls for clarification of US tech billionaire’s role in start-up set to win Bundeswehr contract

German drone maker Stark is facing a growing backlash in Berlin over its ties to US tech billionaire Peter Thiel, days before MPs must approve a critical deal worth up to €2.9bn for the company.

The Berlin-based defence start-up is one of two young companies that have been chosen to supply the Bundeswehr, the German armed forces, with lethal attack drones. But it has faced mounting questions over the role of Thiel, one of its investors, who has close links to Donald Trump and is a vocal sceptic of liberal democracies.

On Tuesday, German defence minister Boris Pistorius — a member of the Social Democrats — voiced unease over Thiel’s involvement in Stark, little more than a week before a decision by the Bundestag’s budget committee on whether to approve the drone supply deal.

Pistorius said he “expressly” shared the concerns of those who were worried about Thiel’s role.

“We simply need to clarify what influence Mr Thiel actually has,” he said on a visit to a special forces command in south-west Germany. “If he has influence over operations, holds a blocking minority in whatever form, then we are talking about a different situation than if he is, for example, a single-digit percentage shareholder but has no influence over operations.”

MPs from the opposition Green party have led the campaign against the start-up.

They have warned the government against striking a deal with a company backed by a figure with ties to the Trump administration, at a time when Europe is seeking to reduce its dependency on the US and called for Stark to find another investor to buy out Thiel’s stake.

Thiel was among the first high-profile figures in tech to back Trump, donating $1.25mn to his 2016 campaign and serving on the president’s transition team. The PayPal co-founder has also been key to JD Vance’s ascent, backing Vance’s venture capital fund in 2020 before bankrolling his Senate run in 2022. 

Stark has declined to disclose the exact size of his stake, saying only that it is less than 10 per cent and does not entail any special voting rights of the kind that would trigger a review under German foreign investment rules.

The company said in a statement that Thiel also had “no information rights relating to our products or business operations”. It added: “Any transfer of technical details concerning our products is subject to German export control regulations and would require prior approval by the Federal Office for Economic Affairs and Export Control.”

Thiel did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Stark’s other backers include the CIA-linked VC fund In-Q-Tel and Döpfner Capital — a fund set up by Moritz Döpfner, the son of Mathias Döpfner, chief executive of media giant Axel Springer. Moritz Döpfner used to work for Thiel and reportedly received $50mn in funding from the billionaire for his new venture.

Sebastian Schäfer, the Green party’s defence specialist on the budget committee, told the FT that Germany would be reliant on drone makers for the security of the armed forces — and the country. “I don’t want to rely on shareholders that want to end our European democracies,” he said.

Schäfer said that Stark, which was valued at €1bn in a recent funding round, should find another investor to buy out Thiel. 

Others have also raised questions about some financial aspects of the contract awarded to Stark, which is larger than the deal awarded simultaneously to Helsing.

Stark’s deal is worth €269mn initially, with the potential to rise to €2.86bn. For Munich-based Helsing, which is backed by Spotify’s Swedish founder Daniel Ek, the deal is worth up to €1.46bn.

The contracts, seen by the FT, also set out differing timeframes for the delivery of the weapons, with a schedule of up to 26 months for Stark’s Virtus drones compared with 13 months for Helsing’s HX-2. 

The number of systems to be delivered by each supplier was redacted from the documents. 

Andreas Schwarz, the Social Democrats’ MP on the budget committee, called for more transparency on the deals. “This important procurement project, with its large and differing contract sizes for the two suppliers, still raises questions and requires clarification,” he told Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper this week.

Pistorius said that all the questions and concerns about pricing would be answered in a session with the defence committee next week.

>>> US After Hours Summary: TCMD +19.9% USNA +12.5%, RSI +9.5%, PBI +9.4%, ATRC

After Hours Summary: TCMD +19.9% USNA +12.5%, RSI +9.5%, PBI +9.4%, ATRC +8.2% higher on earnings; SMWB -17.2%, ACLS -14.4%, LZB -10.1%, PANW -7.7%, MKSI -6.1% lower on earnings

After Hours Gainers:

Companies trading higher in after hours in reaction to earnings/guidance: TCMD +19.9% (also acquires LymphaTech), USNA +12.5%, RSI +9.5%, PBI +9.4%, ATRC +8.2%, RBA +6.6%, SSRM +6.4%, CE +6.2%, CDNS +5%, WTTR +4.6%, AMRZ +4.5% (approves $1 bln share repurchase program and special dividend of $0.44/share), CZR +3.8%, HL +1.9%, ESI +1.8%, NNE +1.1%, FE +0.9%, KVUE +0.5% (also to reduce workforce by approximately 3.5%), ROG +0.4%, EQT +0.4%, MCY +0.3%

Companies trading higher in after hours in reaction to news: NYT +3.3% (Berkshire Hathaway (Warren Buffett) discloses updated portfolio positions in 13F filing: New NYT position), STLD +3.2% (co and SGH Ltd confirm final share proposal to acquire BlueScope Steel), STAA +2.3% (FDA approves an expanded age indication for EVO/EVO+ Visian Implantable Collamer Lenses), DRS +1.9% (awarded contracts for the Missile Defense Agency SHIELD IDIQ), BKKT +1.9% (new partnership with Nexo), META +0.9% (strategic partnership with NVIDIA (NVDA) spanning on-premises, cloud and AI infrastructure), NVDA +0.8% (strategic partnership with Meta (META) spanning on-premises, cloud and AI infrastructure), NVT +0.8% (files mixed shelf offering), ADI +0.7% (increases dividend), AAPL +0.4% (Berkshire Hathaway (Warren Buffett) discloses updated portfolio positions in 13F filing: lowered AAPL), OVV +0.3% (announces agreement to sell its Anadarko assets for $3 bln), VYX +0.1% (increases share repurchase authorization to $300 mln), APTV +0.1% (plans to complete the Electrical Distribution Systems business separation by April 1)

After Hours Losers:

Companies trading lower in after hours in reaction to earnings/guidance: SMWB -17.2%, ACLS -14.4%, LZB -10.1%, PANW -7.7%, MKSI -6.1%, HUN -3.5%, RSG -1%, BBNX -0.9%, BRSP -0.9%, DVN -0.9%, TOL -0.5%, HALO -0.2%

Companies trading lower in after hours in reaction to news: APLD -7.9% (NVIDIA (NVDA) discloses updated portfolio positions in 13F filing: exited APLD), CMPS -6.2% (stock offering), ANET -4.1% (in response to NVDA/META partnership), POR -3.4% (stock offering), GTY -2.4% (stock offering), WPC -2.2% (stock offering), LSCC -1.9% (launches joint cyber resilience reference kit), SNDK -1.8% (stock offering by selling shareholder (WDC)), ZJK -1.6% (files for $300 mln mixed shelf offering), SMX -1.3% (stock offering by selling shareholders), EPRT -1% (stock offering), AGI -0.6% (mineral reserves and resources for FY25), VAL -0.2% (issues fleet status report), HAL -0.2% (receives multiyear contract from KS Orka Renewables)

LE Figaro : "What EDF's report on nuclear fleet modulation really contains"

Due to modulation, EDF reduced its production by 31 terawatt-hours in 2024, then by 33 TWh in 2025. "Part of this modulation was implemented by EDF to save fuel (18 TWh in 2024)," the report's authors specify — faced with low electricity prices, the energy company prefers not to produce in order to avoid using its uranium. The remainder, i.e. 13 TWh of modulation, "was carried out exclusively due to a lack of economic outlets."
Modulation could reach 42.5 TWh in 2028, according to the study's authors, if consumption does not increase — a sharp rise, therefore. "Last year, we produced 373 TWh of nuclear electricity and we had a producible capacity of 410 TWh," says Bernard Fontana, without estimating the lost revenue for the group.
To top it all off, the nuclear fleet is not the only one affected: EDF's hydroelectric dams and gas-fired power plants are also modulating, which further complicates the calculations. The transmission system operator (RTE) has estimated the economic effects of this overcapacity on the entire French electricity system at €20 billion per year, under a slow decarbonization scenario. Hence the persistent response from EDF and the government: electricity use must be expanded, with a target of increasing consumption by 150 TWh by 2035.
No safety concerns
"The safety of our facilities is preserved" in the event of modulation, Bernard Fontana reassures. The CEO then outlined the solutions to be implemented to limit these production variations. The first is "electrification of industrial uses." The process is underway "at ArcelorMittal, Aluminium Dunkerque… In total, there are six hundred electrification projects, and new projects such as the Safran plant," Bernard Fontana lists. Another lever is the establishment of data centers. "EDF is the third-largest landowner in France; we have sites to accommodate them quickly," the CEO states. The public group is also banking on the electrification of transport (electric cars and heavy goods vehicles) and building heating through the development of heat pumps.
To better align consumption with production, other mechanisms are also being activated, such as the introduction of new time slots for off-peak and peak hours, the development of stationary batteries, and the modulation of renewable energy. "More solar and wind installations will have to modulate their production. But the real lever is the electrification of uses," Bernard Fontana nonetheless insists. The EDF CEO welcomes "the publication of the PPE [Pluriannual Energy Plan]. The text confirms the objectives and provides visibility for industrial players."

Le Figaro : Ce que contient vraiment le rapport sur la modulation du parc nucléa

Ce que contient vraiment le rapport sur la modulation du parc nucléaire d’EDF

EXCLUSIF - Les variations à la hausse et à la baisse de la production de ses réacteurs pourraient coûter à EDF plusieurs milliards d’euros au cours des prochaines années. Bernard Fontana, son PDG, interrogé par Le Figaro, rassure sur la capacité de l’entreprise à apporter des réponses.

EDF est confronté à un étrange dilemme. D’un côté, la nouvelle programmation pluriannuelle de l’énergie (PPE 3), publiée vendredi matin, lui fixe un objectif ambitieux de production d’électricité nucléaire. De l’autre, le fonctionnement du marché de l’électricité lui impose de réduire cette même production, notamment quand celle de l’éolien et celle du solaire s’envolent. Cela se traduit par le recours accru à un procédé bien connu de l’exploitant de réacteurs : la modulation de son parc, soit une gestion à la baisse - puis à la hausse - de sa production.

Le phénomène s’est accéléré depuis deux ans, avec la mise en service de nouvelles capacités de production éolienne et solaire, alors que la consommation d’électrons reste atone. « Historiquement, le parc nucléaire a toujours contribué à l’équilibre du système électrique français. Il peut ajuster à la baisse jusqu’à 80 % de sa puissance en trente minutes, jusqu’à deux fois par jour, précise Bernard Fontana, le PDG d’EDF, au Figaro, dans un entretien exclusif. Aujourd’hui, il est confronté à des situations nouvelles, avec des niveaux et des fréquences de modulation plus rapprochés. »

Une interrogation s’est dès lors immiscée dans le débat, jusqu’à sortir du cadre technique pour gagner celui de la politique : quel est le coût de cette modulation ? Ce qui pose en creux une autre question : les renouvelables font-ils perdre de l’argent au nucléaire ? Et la France n’est-elle pas en train de bâtir des surcapacités de production en électricité ? « Nous avons besoin de tout notre parc nucléaire. Les 22 et 23 novembre 2025 (lors d’un pic de froid, NDLR), toutes nos installations tournaient pour répondre à la demande », explique Bernard Fontana. Qui précise que dans le cadre de la PPE 3 « un travail a été engagé afin d’établir une approche consolidée et un chiffrage global du système électrique. EDF y contribue en s’appuyant sur les analyses et les enseignements issus du rapport sur la modulation. » Après des semaines de spéculation sur son contenu, ce rapport, que Le Figaro a consulté, a été publié lundi.

Une accélération de la modulation du parc
Essentiellement centrée sur les éléments techniques, l’étude confirme que la modulation a d’importantes conséquences. Ces baisses de production plus fréquentes peuvent conduire jusqu’à des arrêts de réacteurs, ajoutant de la complexité à leur gestion, aussi bien sur le plan matériel qu’humain. « Nous sommes face à un enjeu économique lié à l’usure prématurée de certains équipements, comme les turbines, les pompes ou les alternateurs, et à une réduction de notre production. Pour une entité avec principalement des coûts fixes, cela impacte directement le coût unitaire de production », résume Bernard Fontana. Pour autant, le chiffrage précis de cet impact s’avère être un casse-tête. « Le chiffrage précis fait partie des choses sur lesquelles nous sommes en train de travailler. Nous avons des éléments, mais pas des coûts complets », reconnaît le PDG.

Les auteurs du rapport ont établi de premières estimations, qui doivent être affinées. L’impact de la modulation sur les coûts de maintenance et les dépenses supplémentaires liés à la mobilisation des équipes serait d’environ 366 millions d’euros par an pour le groupe. À cela s’ajoutent quelque 3 milliards d’euros de charges supplémentaires pour remplacer prématurément des équipements (turbines, pompes ou encore alternateurs). Cependant, de telles dépenses ne sont pas réalisées en une seule fois et sont amorties sur plusieurs années, voire décennies.

À cause de la modulation, EDF a abaissé sa production de 31 térawattheures en 2024, puis de 33 TWh en 2025. « Une partie de cette modulation a été mise en place par EDF pour économiser du combustible (18 TWh en 2024) », précisent les auteurs du rapport - confronté à des prix bas de l’électricité, l’énergéticien préfère ne pas produire pour ne pas utiliser son uranium. Le solde, soit 13 TWh de modulation, « a été réalisé exclusivement en raison de manque de débouchés économiques ».

La modulation pourrait atteindre 42,5 TWh en 2028, selon les auteurs de l’étude, si la consommation n’augmente pas. Une forte hausse, donc. « L’année dernière, nous avons produit 373 TWh d’électricité nucléaire et nous avions un productible de 410 TWh », précise Bernard Fontana, sans évaluer le manque à gagner pour le groupe.

Cerise sur le gâteau, le parc nucléaire n’est pas seul à être concerné : les barrages hydroélectriques et les centrales à gaz d’EDF modulent aussi. Ce qui vient encore compliquer les calculs. Ainsi le gestionnaire du réseau de transport (RTE) a chiffré à 20 milliards d’euros par an les effets économiques de ces surcapacités sur l’ensemble du système électrique français, dans un scénario de décarbonation lente. D’où la réponse obstinée d’EDF et du gouvernement à la question : il faut électrifier les usages, avec un objectif de hausse de la consommation de 150 TWh en 2035.

Pas d’inquiétude sur la sûreté
« La sûreté de nos installations est préservée » en cas de modulation, rassure Bernard Fontana. Et le PDG de préciser les solutions à mettre en place pour limiter ces variations de production. La première est « l’électrification des usages dans l’industrie ». Le processus est lancé « chez ArcelorMittal, Aluminium Dunkerque… Au total, il y a six cents projets d’électrification, et des nouveaux projets, comme l’usine de Safran », égrène Bernard Fontana. Autre levier, l’implantation de centres de données. « EDF est le troisième propriétaire foncier en France, nous avons des terrains pour les accueillir rapidement », indique le PDG. Le groupe public mise aussi sur l’électrification des transports (voitures électriques et poids lourds) et du chauffage des bâtiments avec le développement des pompes à chaleur.

Pour mieux faire correspondre la consommation avec la production, d’autres mécanismes sont également actionnés, comme la mise en place de nouvelles plages horaires pour les heures creuses et les heures pleines, le développement des batteries stationnaires ou encore la modulation des énergies renouvelables. « Davantage d’installations solaires et éoliennes vont devoir moduler leur production. Mais le vrai levier, c’est l’électrification des usages », insiste toutefois Bernard Fontana. Le PDG d’EDF salue « la publication de la PPE. Le texte confirme les objectifs et donne de la visibilité aux acteurs industriels. »

FT : Former prince Andrew agreed to help strike $8bn cash-for-oil deal between U

Former prince Andrew agreed to help strike $8bn cash-for-oil deal between UAE and China
Files show Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor exchanged messages about secret plan with sex offender Jeffrey Epstein

Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor agreed to help negotiate an $8bn cash-for-oil swap between a Chinese sovereign wealth fund and the rulers of the United Arab Emirates during an official visit to China, according to newly released emails.

Mountbatten-Windsor and David Stern, a banker with whom the former prince worked closely, exchanged multiple messages about the plan with Jeffrey Epstein, starting while the disgraced financier was still under house arrest for soliciting sex from an underage girl.

Files released by the US Department of Justice show Mountbatten-Windsor pledged to pursue the secret deal during “private days” at the start of an official, taxpayer-funded trip as a UK special trade representative to China in September 2010.

His efforts followed requests from an Abu Dhabi-based investment banker for help in securing the highly sensitive deal, both through Mountbatten-Windsor’s contacts with the government in China and through his relationship with senior figures in the UAE’s leadership.

The emails show those involved hoped to raise the money from the China Investment Corporation, a state-backed fund that invests overseas. There is no evidence that CIC became involved in or knew of the proposed deal.

Mountbatten-Windsor pursued the deal while a special representative for UK trade and investment, a post he held between 2001 and 2011. While unpaid, the role involved extensive travel, funded from the royal travel budget, which parliament heard in May 2011 had by that point amounted to £4mn.

Mountbatten-Windsor — who was stripped of his title “prince” by his brother King Charles last year — regularly added “private days” on to his official visits, ensuring that he frequently had time to pursue his own business and leisure interests overseas with travel funded from public resources.

The UK’s Thames Valley Police last week said it was assessing evidence to decide whether to launch a full investigation against Mountbatten-Windsor for misconduct in public office following revelations over his conduct while in the role.

Mountbatten-Windsor has consistently denied any financial or sexual wrongdoing arising from his links with Epstein and his circle.

Epstein was found dead in a New York jail cell in 2019 while awaiting trial on child sex charges. He was previously convicted in 2008 of soliciting sex from an underage girl.

The idea for the cash-for-oil swap was suggested to Mountbatten-Windsor by Terence Allen, a banker based in the UAE capital Abu Dhabi, at a time when the global financial crisis was putting substantial pressure on the finances of Dubai, the second most powerful of the seven emirates.

Allen envisaged that China would provide $8bn in funding to the UAE, with the loan repaid over five to seven years in exports to China of Abu Dhabi’s oil.

Mountbatten-Windsor told Allen in an email in July 2010 that he was co-ordinating his trip to China with Stern and that the banker was helping him “as to the way to engage in China”.

“The idea that you write about he has mentioned to me but only in passing and from what I remember he was excited about it and we could work on this in September whilst there,” Mountbatten-Windsor wrote. “I have some private days prior to the official programme starting.”

Allen had previously stressed that he needed access to the top Chinese leadership to make the proposed transaction work.

In an email that Stern forwarded to Epstein in late June 2010, Allen wrote that communication with Beijing needed to be at “the senior most level”. Epstein was released from home detention following his 2008 conviction in July 2010.

While Allen claimed in one email to be on the brink of winning official approval to pursue the loan, there is no proof that UAE officials ever endorsed the loan plan.

The China-UAE deal is one of several potential transactions that Mountbatten-Windsor discussed with Allen in the email exchange in July 2010.

The pair also discussed a potential loan of $3bn from Colonel Muammer Gaddafi’s Libyan government to the UAE, a potential approach by the UAE’s sovereign wealth fund for the UK’s Aston Martin carmaker and the future of RBS, the then state-controlled UK bank.

Mountbatten-Windsor also mentioned the financial problems then facing his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, an issue with which Allen said he wanted to help.

Allen wrote: “I envisage some exciting times ahead.”

There are no explicit discussions in the emails of payments to Mountbatten-Windsor for his role in facilitating any deal.

There is no evidence that any of the transactions discussed between Allen, Stern, Mountbatten-Windsor and Epstein went ahead.

Allen and Mountbatten-Windsor did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Stern could not be reached for comment.