When conservative billionaire Pierre-Édouard Stérin caught the eye of Le Monde last year, the newspaper noted how stealthily he was “advancing his pawns” in the chess game of hard-right French politics. A tax exile based in Belgium, Stérin had just been outed as the financial force and guiding spirit behind Pericles, “a secret, wide-ranging project aimed at boosting right-wing forces” and restoring “France’s grandeur”, to quote Politico. The timely leaking of internal documents – in which the shady group vowed to achieve “the successful exercise of power at the earliest opportunity” – caused a sensation in France, unleashing a potent mix of conspiracy theory and patriotic debate. The country’s current political chaos provides ample opportunity for a re-run.
Stérin is leaving no stone unturned in his quest to revive France with his bespoke prescription of retro Catholic morality, dry economics and a hardline “re-migration” message that even Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party dubs “toxic”, says The Times. He has spent hundreds of millions of euros at the grassroots, with education a key target. In addition to ridding France of “the woke insanity imported from American universities”, he’s planning “a network of Christian private schools”. He’s also an investor in Studio 496, whose mission is to conserve the heritage of “La France profonde” by sponsoring activities such as village fetes. More overtly political projects include a Parisian think tank and a training college for would-be candidates.
Some call “the billionaire who wants to make France great again” the country’s Elon Musk. In truth, he’s more “eminence grise” – happiest pulling strings from the shadows, says Politico. A self-described introvert, with “a tendency for extreme rationalism”, Stérin famously ranks new acquaintances on a scale of one to ten on a dedicated Excel spreadsheet. His wife Amandine wasn’t exempt. He scored her on a strict set of marriageability criteria before popping the question. Fortunately, she delivered – quite literally: bearing her “pronatalist” husband a fine family of five. He’s raising them on tough love, telling the French financial weekly Challenges that they won’t inherit anything. “It’s a real freedom to start with nothing in life.”
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Stérin, 51, grew up in a middle-class family in Evreux, a town in Normandy, where he began his career as an entrepreneur at the age of 13, selling RAM sticks for video games, says The Times. He launched 20 failed businesses before striking gold. Smartbox, a gift-box provider specialising in short breaks, proved hugely popular and established his financial clout. These days his investment firm, Otium Capital, has assets ranging from tech to health.
Stérin has donated generously to Le Pen’s party, but says he is keeping his options open – viewing the popularist Rally party as too wedded to the state in its “dirigiste” economic thinking and too liberal on social matters such as abortion. Nonetheless, the links run deep, says Politico. The CEO of Stérin’s Otium fund, François Durvye, is also “a member of Marine Le Pen’s inner circle and one of her most trusted advisers”.
Pierre-Édouard Stérin is reaching for heaven
By US standards, Stérin’s wealth – he is said to be worth €1.6 billion – and political largesse look trivial. But the rules on political donations in France are much tighter, and he has been in the crosshairs of prosecutors. Stérin is now in the frustrating position of being a wealthy backer in search of a candidate. But for the moment, he is attending to his soul. “By giving away my fortune… I am optimising my chances of eternal life,” he told Catholic daily La Croix. Typically, he’s researched the process thoroughly. “I typed on Google: how to become a saint.” It is “an ultra-motivating stimulus to get up in the morning”.
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