As an asset manager Edouard Carmignac well understands the challenge Europe's elderly will face, financing their retirement. It was nice, therefore, to see his firm help four of them from Britain with some part-time work last night in Paris.
Carmignac Gestion, the €50bn Paris-headquartered firm he co-founded, gave what was no doubt only pocket money for four UK pensioners - Mick Jagger, Ronnie Woods, Charlie Watts and Keith Richards, known collectively as The Rolling Stones - to play a private concert last night in Paris.
Held in the intimate Theatre Mogador, not far from Carmignac's offices in Place Vendome, the gig lasted about 90 minutes, and stunned about 600 of Carmignac's clients, staff, some journalists and press agents.
Jagger and his band played many of their well-known hits.
They opened with It's Only Rock n' Roll (But I Like It), sending the audience into a frenzy. (Edouard Carmignac had hinted to his plans for the evening earlier in the day as he intertwined that song's iconic title into his presentation on global markets.)
The Rolling Stones then also played some more of their recent songs, but also well-loved hits including You Can't Always Get What You Want, Honky Tonk Women, Start Me Up, Miss You and, of course, Jumpin' Jack Flash.
The appearance of ‘The Stones' for Carmignac was a badly kept secret, with predictions of the concert reported on the internet late last week.
The ticket to the event read The Biggest Secret Event of the Year - by the time it started it was the biggest event of the year for all those there, but no secret.
The publicity did not, however, diminish the thrill of seeing the rock quartet, even if each member is now over 60 years old.
Even 200 or so Paris residents lined the street outside Mogador, which was barred off with barriers and lined with police, in the hope of seeing the musicians arrive.
Jagger joked with the audience, saying he had read Carmignac's open letter to French president Francois Hollande - where Carmignac had criticised Hollande's "plan to fleece the entire country to sustain the survival of an obsolete social welfare system". He then added that he had not read of any reply from Hollande, and asked, had the president had been invited to the concert?
Jagger also said he had not met Carmignac himself, "but Queen Elizabeth has said some very things about him to me".
Much was made in the UK press in 2008 when Jagger qualified, thanks to passing his 65th birthday, for free travel on British public transport.
Strangely, he and his band members are nowhere to be seen on London's Tube or buses, doing most of their commuting in limousines, or private jets, to just such private concerts. It is not known, nor revealed, how much Carmignac paid for the privilege, but figures of up to €5m were being mentioned in the audience.
Earlier this year Carmignac Gestion had enlisted another ageing rocker, Rod Stewart - also able to travel free in the UK - for a similarly breathtaking concert for clients.
Last night, Jagger danced like a mixture of an angry, strutting ostrich and a furious ragdoll, jabbing his finger with verve towards the screaming audience as he raised the tempo.
He may be 69, but he still dances like a 20-year old.
The year 1989, when Carmignac and Eric Helderle founded the fund manager that paid for his band's drinks last night, Jagger and The Rolling Stones were inducted into the American Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Rolling Stone magazine ranked them the fourth of its 100 Greatest Artists of All Time.
Their albums - 22 studio albums in the UK and 24 in the US, plus 11 live albums - are estimated to have sold more than 200 million worldwide.
Last night, the Rolling Stones showed that 50 years after the original band members first played together, the group has lost none of its fizz.
And Jumping Jack Flash is still well and truly jumping.
http://www.investmenteurope.net/investment-europe/news/2220744/veritas-carmignac...
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2nd Warm-Up Gig - Theatre Mogador, Paris 29/10/12 (Read 9,506 times)
