Thread by @artisbrutal2021

What's this now?

Police search Boston Consulting Group offices in Angolan corruption probe against Isabel dos Santos..

Let's break it down..

https://twitter.com/InvestorReddit/status/1618643765043896328

"The investigation also revealed how U.S. and European consulting companies, including BCG and PwC, advised dos Santos for years despite widespread reports of corruption by dos Santos"

icij.org/investigations…

Why I know some of these faces

Pausing at the entrance to a star-studded bash at the Cannes Film Festival, ’90s icon Sharon Stone flashed her one-of-a-kind cuff bracelet. It was a wraparound hippo with rubies for eyes, sapphire nostrils and white diamond teeth. ..

"The dazzling ornament was a creation of de Grisogono, a Swiss luxury jeweler and the host of the exclusive event, held at the Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc on the French Riviera...

https://twitter.com/artisbrutal2021/status/1516746697979875330

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De Grisogono had thrown Cannes parties before. But this one in May 2013 was especially sumptuous..

Underwriting the festivities: the government of Angola, a country with one of the highest poverty rates in the world..

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"Angola’s diamond trading company, known as Sodiam, and a Congolese businessman married to Isabel dos Santos, daughter of the country’s then-president, had acquired a controlling stake in the struggling jeweler the year before..

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https://twitter.com/artisbrutal2021/status/1480863650768375812

Its new managers, who included former employees of the management-consulting giant BOSTON CONSULTING GROUP , which had briefly helped run the jeweler, hoped the bash would help halt a long decline in sales. Stone was that year’s “ambassador,”..

The plan didn’t work. De Grisogono sold just $5.6 million of its wares through private sales in 2013, far short of its $33 million target, and took on more and more debt...

Dos Santos and her husband, Sindika Dokolo, amassed an empire of more than 400 companies and subsidiaries in 41 countries, including at least 94 in secrecy jurisdictions like Malta, Mauritius and Hong Kong...

Cannes 2015?

https://twitter.com/artisbrutal2021/status/1534528117653618688

"From storefront offices in the tiny tax haven of Malta to conference rooms in Switzerland and Angola, Boston Consulting, PwC (formerly PricewaterhouseCoopers), KPMG and other major firms helped sustain the dos Santos empire for years...

"The Angolan government’s unlikely investment in a jewelry company can be traced to a series of transactions in 2012 that quietly routed millions of dollars through shell companies in Malta and the British Virgin Islands...

The transactions, ICIJ has found, gave dos Santos’ husband, Dokolo, full management control of the Swiss jeweler despite a substantial investment by the Angolan agency...

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https://twitter.com/artisbrutal2021/status/1464882252475740168

"..a remarkable story of self-dealing and profiteering by a businesswoman whose vast fortune, and appealing narrative, bought access to such prestigious Western institutions as the World Economic Forum #WEF and the London Business School... 😏

"Dos Santos was scheduled to attend the 2020 WEF meeting in Davos, ..after Unitel, a mobile phone company she partly owns, was named an associate partner in 2019. Following the asset freezes, however, the WEF said dos Santos was no longer coming to the annual meeting..

"Each of the Big Four accounting firms worked for dos Santos companies long after many banks had broken ties. Deloitte served as auditor for Finstar, an Angolan satellite TV company partly owned by dos Santos..

"McKinsey & Company, Boston Consulting and Booz Allen Hamilton continued their relationships with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia after the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, according to news reports ..

https://twitter.com/artisbrutal2021/status/1618587193915879427

"From 2010 to 2016, BOSTON CONSULTING sent invoices for at least $4.3 million to companies owned or partly owned by dos Santos and Dokolo.. including more than $3.5 million for a subcontract from Wise Intelligence Solutions Limited, a Maltese company owned by the couple

Fawaz Gruosi, a silver-haired former salesman for other high-end jewelers, made a point of throwing parties that attracted the likes of Naomi Campbell, Heidi Klum and Ivana Trump.

https://twitter.com/artisbrutal2021/status/1513726446631628800

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https://twitter.com/artisbrutal2021/status/1617883513667325958