Fired CFO in $4.7M Fight With Moët Hennessy Over NDA

Moët Hennessy and its ousted finance chief are embroiled in a legal spat after the drinks giant accused him of violating a non-disclosure agreement by leaking secrets for an article about his partner’s sexual-harassment claim.

Mark Stead signed the NDA in July 2024 as part of a settlement after being dismissed for alleged expense abuses, including a stay at a New York luxury hotel. The deal gave him severance but bound him to strict confidentiality and non-disparagement clauses.

Now the company says Stead fed information to news outlet La Lettre as part of a report about how Moët Hennessy handled the separate complaint filed by Maria Gasparovic, who was also a colleague and former senior manager. At a hearing in Paris on Friday, the company’s lawyer argued that some details in the September 2024 article could only have come from him.

Stead’s own lawyer Eric Charlery denied the assertion, calling his client’s dismissal “a ploy” and arguing that the lawsuit is meant to punish him for supporting Gasparovic. He is asking judges to scrap the settlement, which he claims is preventing him to blow the whistle on harassment suffered by his partner, and is also pursuing unfair-dismissal and damages claims that could push his overall demand beyond €4 million ($4.7 million).

Charlery said Moët Hennessy escalated the row by publicly accusing the former chief financial officer and Gasparovic in La Lettre of trying to blackmail the company into a bigger payout — an allegation he says has wrecked his client’s reputation and breached the deal’s non-disparagement clause.

“Mark Stead is now a pariah,” Charlery told the tribunal. “When a company run by Bernard Arnault accuses you of blackmail, word gets around.”

Moët Hennessy, which kicked-off the dispute by suing Stead for €135,000, maintains he broke the settlement and has also filed a defamation complaint against Gasparovic.

The dispute comes as the LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton SE unit faces a string of lawsuits while cutting staff after a management shake-up. Last month a former digital sales executive sought €1.7 million, saying he was really fired for flagging sanctions-busting sales to Russia. Gasparovic is also suing Moët Hennessy in her own case while facing the company’s defamation countersuit.

Charlery said Stead agreed to the NDA “to have peace.” But that hasn’t worked, and he is now struggling to find a comparable senior finance role.

LVMH didn’t respond to a request for comment and Charlery declined to comment further outside the courtroom. A ruling in Stead’s case is due Nov. 19.