Gerard Depardieu has become the latest rich Frenchman to flee his country and the stinging wealth taxes levied by Francois Hollande, the Socialist President of France, reports The Daily Telegraph.
The film star has bought a property in Nechin, a Belgian village near the border with France, which has become a colony for French exiles fleeing President Hollande's tax rate of 75 per cent on all earnings over €1 million.
Belgian newspaper Le Soir reported he was "acquiring a pied-a-terre" after Mr Depardieu, 64, was seen celebrating his new property purchase at an expensive restaurant in the nearby town of Estaimpuis.
"The issue has not yet received an official response but one thing is certain: on Monday, the actor and businessman made a detour through the border town of Estaimpuis to a notary to sign the purchase of a property in Nechin," the newspaper reported.
The actor, who had backed Nicolas Sarkozy during the presidential campaign earlier this year, is the latest high-profile French citizen to cross the border into francophone Wallonia in southern Belgium, which now has lower wealth taxes than newly Socialist France.
Mr Depardieu, who recently played the Gallic hero Obelix in a screen version of Asterix, joins Bernard Arnault, Europe's richest man and the owner of Christian Dior, the epitome of French chic, who shocked France when announced he was seeking Belgian nationality two months ago.
Read more of this report from The Daily Telegraph.