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| Sunday, 4 July 2004 |
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Goldman ratchets up row with Rose Investment bank brushes off Marks & Spencer chief's deadline for retraction of 'damaging' allegation (The Guardian)Goldman Sachs yesterday refused to apologise to Stuart Rose, the Marks & Spencer chief executive who had accused the investment bank of "promoting an untruth to damage my reputation" and to further its interests as a financial backer of Philip Green. The row over Mr Rose's remarks allegedly overheard at the Chelsea Flower Show may now only be resolved as part of the Financial Services Authority's inquiry into share dealings in M&S before Mr Green's o8bn-plus bid. As the tension between the camps escalated further last night, M&S appeared to have approached consultants to improve its security. It is thought the firm is concerned that Mr Rose's mobile phone records may be in somebody else's hands. The retailer would only say: "We were concerned about our security and approached two firms - Kroll and Control Risks - and were told neither of them were free to act. They say they have a conflict." Rose set a deadline of 5pm yesterday for Goldman Sachs to provide a written retraction of allegations that he had told Bradford & Bingley finance director Rosemary Thorne that he would be chairman of Mr Green's bid vehicle. The conversation is said to have taken place when the pair spoke at Chelsea on May 24, three days before Mr Green went public with his proposal and a week before Rose was appointed chief executive of M&S. Yesterday's deadline passed without an apology or retraction from Goldman Sachs, despite Rose's angry letter to Peter Sutherland, the bank's head of European business. It is thought Goldman plans instead to send a "brush off" reply, saying merely it will comply with the FSA inquiry. That will be interpreted as Goldman sticking to its story. Senior figures at the bank are understood to be confident that Ms Thorne told them unambiguously on four occasions of Rose's remarks. Ms Thorne, who joined B&B from Sainsbury's as part of the team to lead its stock market flotation, is thought to be furious to find herself at the cen tre of the bitter row. There is already intense speculation that the former building society will axe Goldman as its financial adviser. A B&B spokeswoman yesterday described her meeting with Mr Rose at Chelsea as "brief and sociable", and refused to give further detail of the conversation. Rose, however, is clearly counting on her to back up his version of events. In his letter of complaint to Goldman, he referred to having a statement from her - although he did not identify her by name - saying that he did not say Mr Green would bid or that he would be chairing any bid vehicle from Mr Green. Rose believes confusion may have arisen because he admits that he did mention to Ms Thorne that an announcement might be made soon about his appointment as chairman of another company, which he did not name. M&S last night did not react to Goldman's refusal to apologise. Instead, it merely reiterated its earlier statement, saying the board was "totally supportive of Mr Rose". The key passage read: "Stuart Rose was not offered the job of chairman of Philip Green's bid vehicle and has never claimed that he was." Rose is expected to be questioned by the FSA today about the timing of his purchase of 100,000 M&S shares on May 7. M&S's advisers at Cazenove were thought to have had contact with major institutional investors yesterday and attempted to make them aware of the situation. |
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