LONDON – The winter sun was low in the sky on Nice’s Promenade des Anglais when the $650,000 Ferrari Enzo driven by Suleiman Kerimov, skidded into a tree and burst into flames.
The Kremlin-connected tycoon and his passenger—the glamorous Russian TV anchor, Tina Kandelaki—were pulled out of the wreckage by passersby.
Kerimov was badly burned and in critical condition. Barely alive, he was flown by helicopter to a hospital in nearby Marseilles and placed in intensive care.
Kerimov survived, but the incident left senior staffers at Barclays—a bank which does business with some of Russia’s richest individuals and their companies—deeply unsettled.
Now, as Barclays’ investment banking practices come under the spotlight with inquiries into its rigging of Libor, the Kerimov episode provides echoes from the past.
