Areva ex-chief under formal investigation over UraMin affair

The former chief executive of Areva, the French nuclear group, has been placed under formal investigation in France over her role in an ill-fated acquisition of a number of African uranium mines.

Anne Lauvergeon spent the day on Friday answering questions in front of national prosecutors over whether she deliberately submitted misleading annual accounts that concealed huge writedowns on its €1.8bn investment in Uramin in 2007.

Following the hearing she was placed under formal investigation for the “publication of inaccurate accounts” and the “spreading of false information”, the office of the French prosecutors told the Financial Times.

Areva bought UraMin, a Canada-based company with assets in Namibia, the Central African Republic and South Africa, when uranium was about $138 a pound in 2007. In 2011 the company wrote off nearly the entire stake as prices dropped following the Fukushima disaster.

UraMin also turned out to have far smaller uranium deposits than hoped.

The write-off was a blow to the reputation of Ms Lauvergeon, who ran the company between 2001 and 2011, and was also an embarrassment to the French government, which sanctioned the purchase.

The Cour des Comptes, France’s public auditor, conducted an audit of Areva’s accounts between 2006 and 2012 and found irregularities. They referred the case to the national financial prosecutors, who started an investigation in 2014.

In March the prosecutors made their first move in the case since 2014, opening a formal investigation into alleged insider trading by Olivier Fric, the husband of Ms Lauvergeon.

He is suspected of having used inside information to profit from buying shares in UraMin shortly before the announcement of the takeover by Areva. His lawyers have denied that he profited from inside information.

Ms Lauvergeon and the Uramin affair has already prompted multiple scandals in France. She hit out at the company in 2012 when it emerged that a former employee had hired a Swiss private investigator, Alp Services, to look into the 2007 acquisition.

The Swiss probe found no evidence of wrongdoing in the UraMin deal. Ms Lauvergeon, known as “Atomic Anne”, said she had been the victim of a long-running “plot” to destabilise her.

Ms Lauvergeon was a key economics adviser to François Mitterrand, the French former president, before being named to head nuclear energy agency Cogema, which she merged with Framatome to form Areva in 2001.