Brad Pitt sues Angelina Jolie over French winery

Brad Pitt sued his former wife Angelina Jolie for selling her stake in a French winery they had bought together to a Russian businessman.

In a lawsuit filed in Los Angeles on Thursday, Pitt said Jolie broke their agreement not to sell their interests in Chateau Miraval without the other's consent by selling her stake to a unit of Stoli Group, a spirits maker controlled by oligarch Yuri Shefler.

Pitt and Jolie bought the Miraval estate in 2008 for $28.4 million, Vanity Fair reported. It is also where they were married in 2014.

The actor said he had “poured money and sweat equity” into making Miraval among the world's most highly regarded makers of rose wine, with annual revenue exceeding $50m, the complaint said.

The estate is home to three types of rose wine and a sparkling wine, The Wall Street Journal reported.

He accused Jolie of seeking “unearned windfall profits” from his work, while inflicting “gratuitous harm".

Lawyers for Jolie did not immediately respond on Friday to requests for comment.

The lawsuit states Jolie told Pitt in January 2021 she had reached a “painful decision, with a heavy heart” to sell her Miraval stake and could no longer own an alcohol-based business because of her personal objections.

Buyout talks between Pitt and Jolie broke down five months later, the complaint said.

Tenute del Mondo, a unit of privately owned Stoli, announced its purchase of Jolie's stake in October.

The lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court seeks unspecified compensatory and punitive damages for breach of contract and other legal claims. Pitt's lawyers requested a trial by jury.

Jolie filed for divorce from Pitt in 2016 and it became final in 2019. They have six children.

Pitt won Academy Awards in 2014 for helping produce Best Picture winner 12 Years a Slave and in 2020 for Best Supporting Actor in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

Jolie won an Academy Award in 2000 for Best Supporting Actress in Girl, Interrupted.

– Reuters contributed to this report

Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.

Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.

“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.

“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.

Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.

From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.

Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.

BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.

Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.

Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.

“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.

“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.

“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”

The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”

Brad Pitt sues Angelina Jolie over French winery

'Girl, Interrupted' actress sold her stake in Chateau Miraval to Russian businessman