Bolloré fined €3m by Italian regulator over market manipulation Vincent Bolloré is responsible for the Autolib electric car-sharing scheme in Paris Italy's markets regulator has hit Vincent Bolloré with a €3m market manipulation fine and banned the French industrialist from holding board seats at Italy-listed companies for 18 months. The penalty meted out to Mr Bolloré was related to trades made in 2010 on companies owned by the Ligresti construction-to-finance dynasty, Consob said in a statement. Salvatore Ligresti, the dynasty's patriarch, is facing trial for allegedly falsifying accounts at the Fonsai insurance group, allowing his family to reap dividends worth €200m illegally. Head of the Bolloré industrial group and chairman of Vivendi, the French media and telecommunications group, Mr Bolloré has been a prominent figure in Italy for the past decade. He and his companies were part of the so-called galaxy of Italian financial shareholding that saw many of Italy's most important banks and industrial companies linked through a series of cross shareholdings. He has stepped down from his Italian roles in the past two years as the European debt crisis has forced Italian groups to sell some or all of their stakes in each other. Mr Bolloré exited the board of insurer Generali in October and quit the board of Milanese investment bank Mediobanca in April 2012. According to the Consob statement, Mr Bolloré in 2010 bought more than 2 per cent of Premafin, the Ligresti family holding company that owned Italy-listed insurance groups Fonsai and Milano Assicurazioni, and indicated he intended to increase this stake. His move triggered market speculation that a merger of Fonsai and Mr Bolloré"s company Groupama was on the cards. Premafin's share price subsequently jumped. Consob said the share purchase of Premafin undertaken by Mr Bolloré through his holding companies Financière de l'Odet and Financiere du Perguet "had fixed the Premafin price at an artificial level" and given "indications that were both false and misleading." Mr Bolloré issued a statement saying that Financière de l'Odet was "in full conformity with the law" when it bought its stake in Premafin. "The required statements about the thresholds were made at the time and it was also announced that the investment in Premafin would be both limited and for the long term, which is the case," he said. The Bolloré family continues to play an active role on the European corporate scene. Mr Bolloré, who turned his family's business manufacturing paper for cigarettes and bibles into a €10bn corporate empire, is Vivendi's largest shareholder with a 5 per cent stake. Earlier this month it was revealed his son Yannick would become the global chief executive of the Paris-based Havas advertising group. Vincent Bolloré is that group's largest shareholder. Additional reporting by Michael Stothard in Paris