In yet another twist of the drawn-out legal battle around the sale of Adidas by Bernard Tapie to investors around Robert Louis-Dreyfus in 1993, the French businessman has been ordered by the appeal court in Paris to reimburse €404.6 million to the French state. Alleging that he was duped by the formerly state-owned Crédit Lyonnais bank into selling Adidas at less than its value, Tapie had previously been awarded €285 million, with interest and damages raising the amount to €403 million for Tapie and his wife. This was to be financed by taxpayers, because the French state took over some of the Crédit Lyonnais' assets after its failure. But the 2008 ruling was annulled earlier this year, amid an ongoing investigation into allegations of high-level manipulation around the arbitration process. When the case returned to the court of appeal, Tapie upped the ante by requesting economic and moral damages of up to €1,174 million. Tapie's lawyer described the appeal court's latest ruling as a denial of justice and indicated that he was studying ways to take the case further. However, this may not suspend Tapie's payment obligation, which he says he cannot fulfill because he never received all of the €403 million.

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