Monday, November 05, 2007

Model won't accept dollars

With earnings of more than $30 million a year, she rarely wakes up for much less than $100,000 a day. Now Gisele Bundchen has decided to stay in bed unless she's paid in euros.

In a dispatch to dismay loyal fans of the greenback, Bloomberg news agency reported today that the Brazilian supermodel is telling prospective employers that she no longer accepts American dollars.

Ms Bundchen reportedly asked Proctor & Gamble to pay her in euros when she signed a deal to represent Pantene hair products back in August. The Brazilian weekly Vega reported that she will also get euros for a recent deal with Dolce & Gabbana to promote the designers' new perfume.

"Contracts starting now are more attractive in euros because we don't know what will happen to the dollar," Patricia Bundchen, the model's manager and twin sister, told Bloomberg.

Ms Bundchen is in good company. The US dollar has lost around one-third of its value since 2001 and is trading at record lows against the euro, Canadian dollar and Chinese yuan. It is at its cheapest for 26 years against the pound sterling.

Bloomberg put Ms Bundchen alongside the billionaire investors Warren Buffett and Bill Gross "at the top of a growing list of rich people who have concluded that the currency can only depreciate because Americans led by President George W. Bush are living beyond their means".

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