Margarita Louis-Dreyfus Biography: Husband, Ethnicity, Businesses, Net Worth, Age, Parents, Controversy, Religion

Margarita Louis-Dreyfus is a Russian-born Swiss billionaire businesswoman best known as the controlling shareholder who took charge of Louis Dreyfus Company, one of the world’s major agricultural merchant houses.

She entered the global spotlight after the death of her husband, Robert Louis-Dreyfus, when she became the central figure behind the group’s ownership structure and its most consequential turning points—ranging from the sale of Olympique de Marseille to a high-profile strategic deal that brought Abu Dhabi’s ADQ in as a major minority investor.

Profile

• Full name: Margarita Louis-Dreyfus
• Date of birth: 1 July 1962
• Age: 63 years old
• Gender: Female
• Place of birth: Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg), Russian SFSR, Soviet Union
• Nationality: Swiss
• Profession: Businesswoman, chairperson (Louis Dreyfus Company)
• Parents: Oleg (father) and Natalia (mother), née Bogdanova
• Siblings: Only child
• Spouse: Robert Louis-Dreyfus (married 1992; died 2009)
• Children: Éric Louis-Dreyfus,Maurice Louis-Dreyfus, Kyril Louis-Dreyfus
• Relationship status: Widowed
• Religion: Christian
• Ethnicity: Swiss – Russian
• Net worth: $5.0 billion

Early Life and Education

Margarita Louis-Dreyfus is now 63 years old. She was born Margarita Olegovna Bogdanova on 1 July 1962 in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg). She later relocated to Switzerland and eventually became a Swiss citizen.

Her parents’ first names were reportedly Oleg (father) and Natalia (mother), née Bogdanova. They both died in a train accident when she was either seven or eleven years old.

Following the tragedy, she was primarily raised by her grandfather, Leonid Bogdanov, an electrical engineer. He ensured she received an education, and she went on to study law at Moscow State University and economics at the Leningrad Institute of Soviet Trade.

Personal Life

Margarita Louis-Dreyfus met Robert Louis-Dreyfus in 1988 on a flight from Zurich to London. They married in 1992 and built a family together that included three sons: Éric Louis-Dreyfus, and twins Maurice Louis-Dreyfus and Kyril Louis-Dreyfus.

Robert Louis-Dreyfus died in Zurich on 4 July 2009 after a long period with leukemia. His death changed her life overnight, not only because of the family’s standing, but because it placed her at the center of a complicated ownership structure connected to the Louis-Dreyfus name, the wider family network, and the operating company’s leadership.

Years later, her private life returned to headlines when she had twin daughters in 2016. Reporting around the birth described her as the controlling shareholder and chairwoman of the trading group at the time.

Career

Margarita Louis-Dreyfus is most closely linked to Louis Dreyfus Company, one of the historic commodity merchant houses that grew into a modern global business spanning origination, processing, logistics, and marketing of agricultural goods.

Her transition into leadership is tied directly to succession: after Robert Louis-Dreyfus’s death in 2009, she took over as chair of the group and became the key decision-maker behind the ownership vehicle that controls the company.

The first years of her chairmanship were closely watched because they involved a shift from a long era associated with her husband to an era where she had to establish authority in a business known for discretion.

In 2012, major business reporting described a shake-up at the top of the trading group as she removed senior figures who had been running the company, signaling that the post-2009 governance style would be defined by her willingness to make decisive internal changes.

At the same time, the Louis-Dreyfus name comes with a complicated family shareholder history, and that public backdrop repeatedly surfaced in dispute narratives.

Over the years, minority family stakeholders pushed for buyouts and sought to redefine their position, and the situation attracted periodic attention in business media.

Her long-term response became clearer in 2019, when the group announced that the majority shareholder had completed a buyout for minority shareholders who wished to exit—an event explicitly framed as closing a chapter and stabilizing ownership. The announcement stated that the transaction brought Akira’s stake in the group to 96.2%, effectively consolidating control.

A second major turning point came in November 2020, when Louis Dreyfus Company announced an agreement to sell an indirect 45% equity stake to ADQ, a holding company based in Abu Dhabi, alongside a long-term supply arrangement to the UAE.

The deal mattered in two ways: it was a rare opening of capital for a traditionally private group, and it created a strategic partnership that linked LDC’s trading and logistics footprint more closely with a major state-backed buyer and investor.

Net Worth

Margarita Louis-Dreyfus’s net worth is approximately $5.0 billion, with year-to-year variation influenced by dividends, capital structure decisions, commodity-cycle profitability, and ownership events such as the ADQ stake sale.

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