Hot weeks for Rodolphe Saadé, the boss of the transalpine logistics-shipping group CMA CGM.
During a very long hearing before one of the economic committees of the Assemblée nationale, prompted by the group’s latest expansion in the media sector, the magnate was also asked some questions regarding the tax contribution of a group with 160,000 employees, within the framework of the increasingly difficult situation of French public finances.
At the center of attention, in particular, was the flat-rate tonnage tax regime. “This system is in force in most of the major maritime economies. It is essential that France remains on the same level as its competitors in the merchant marine sector, given that the tonnage tax affects 90% of the world fleet and the entire European fleet.”
Saadé explained that “the tonnage tax is a strategic lever for the attractiveness of the French flag and the competitiveness of our sector on a European scale. This tax regime applies only to the group’s maritime transport activities. Our logistics, port, and media activities are subject to the traditional corporate tax.” He also recalled that CMA CGM employs 20,000 people on land in France, 1,000 seafarers, and generates 55,000 indirect jobs, contributing to the country’s GDP growth. He emphasized that the company maintains its headquarters in Marseille, generates 12% of its turnover and 13% of its cash flow in France, and has reinvested 85% of its profits in the country.
A few days ago, then, the magazine Mediapart revealed how some managers of CMA CGM recently traveled to Russia. The French group denied the intention to ‘reopen’ in Russia but confirmed the visit of its two representatives to Saint Petersburg, justifying the trip with the desire to “visit” an office that had been “inactive” for over three years, given that the group had declared a stop to its activities in Russia in 2022.
“It was only on this occasion,” according to what was reported to Mediapart by CMA CGM’s press office, “that the executives noticed that twenty-eight Russian and international shipping companies had never ceased their activities and had maintained their operations in Russia,” among them also MSC.
No clarification, however, was provided regarding the involvement of the French Government by CMA CGM, which nevertheless appears to have been informed, nor regarding that of the Trump administration, to whose closeness Saadé has given several proofs and which could hardly be bypassed for a move of this type.
Conversely, from the Russian partners’ side, the possibility of the French group’s return is viewed with suspicion. After having interrupted calls in Ukraine for security reasons following the start of the war, CMA CGM announced in January 2025 the start of a line connecting Piraeus (Greece) and Istanbul (Turkey) to the port of Odessa. The strategy of Rodolphe Saadé’s group is also seen from the Russian side through the prism of its media branch, embodied by the 24-hour news channel BFMTV, a channel that has clearly followed, until now, an anti-Kremlin line. Things could now change.
