A founder of global gaming company Ubisoft, maker of Assassin’s Creed, was killed in a plane crash in western France, authorities said Saturday.
The twin-motor Cessna 421 carrying Claude Guillemot and a flight instructor crashed Friday evening near La Baule airport on the Atlantic coast, Mayor Franck Louvrier said in a statement. Both were licensed and experienced pilots. The instructor also was killed, the mayor said. An investigation is underway.
Guillemot was 69 years old.
Ubisoft confirmed Guillemot’s death but did not comment further.
The plane crashed in a field just before landing at La Baule-Escoublac Airport, an airport official told The Associated Press. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to be publicly named.
Guillemot and four brothers founded Ubisoft in 1986. In addition to the popular Assassin’s Creed franchise, Ubisoft’s games also include Just Dance, and the Rayman and Tom Clancy game franchises.

WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve has for decades moved steadily from a remote, opaque government agency that shared little about what it did or why to a more transparent institution willing to explain how it makes decisions and what it thinks about the economy.
But in his first press conference Wednesday, new chair Kevin Warsh began to reverse some of those steps. Warsh, like many economists, thinks the financial markets have become too dependent on Fed guidance, and that such direction is more effective in financial crises or economic downturns.
Warsh quickly made changes: The Fed’s statement on its interest-rate decision was slashed to 132 words, from 341 in April. And Warsh pointedly noted that the statement excluded any hints, or “forward guidance,” about what the Fed’s next moves might be.
In short, Warsh rapidly delivered on a promise to slash the Fed’s communications, particularly the guidance it gives to financial markets about its next interest-rate moves. Yet such an approach carries the risk of more violent swings in stock and bond prices, analysts say, and ultimately could lead to higher interest rates for consumers and businesses.
“Forward guidance in general has served to suppress volatility and anchor market expectations,” said George Pearkes, global macro strategist at Bespoke Investment Group. “And that has led to lower borrowing rates, relative to alternatives.”
Still, the impact on consumers is likely to be modest, Pearkes added, with mortgage rates perhaps a quarter-point higher than they would be otherwise.
Financial markets see-sawed, then fell Wednesday after the statement and news conference. The yield on the 10-year Treasury, which strongly influences mortgage rates, jumped Wednesday to 4.49% from 4.43%, though it fell back in Thursday trading. The yield on the 2-year Treasury, which closely tracks expectations for Fed action, was 4.16% Thursday, up sharply from 4.05% before the Fed’s meeting. The broad S & P 500 stock index dropped 1.2% Wednesday.
Such swings could be a sign of things to come. Previous chairs have signaled the Fed’s next moves clearly enough that financial markets have largely anticipated the central bank’s actions. But Warsh has frequently cited as a model former chair Alan Greenspan, whose circumspect comments often kept investors guessing.
Greenspan, who served as chair from 1987 to 2005, did usher in the statement the Fed now issues after each meeting announcing its decision. The first statement was issued Feb. 4, 1994, and said the Fed would increase its key rate for the first time in five years. The move caught investors off-guard and the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged 2.4% that day.
The paring back of Fed communications is part of a larger package of potential reforms to the central bank’s operations that Warsh signaled Wednesday. He announced that the Fed will set up five task forces to examine the Fed’s communications, its balance sheet, how it analyzes and gathers economic data, the impact of AI on productivity and jobs, and the frameworks it uses to analyze inflation.
Warsh said the communications task force would consider changes to the quarterly economic projections the Fed issues as well as look at other recent innovations, including press conferences. Former chair Ben Bernanke was the first to hold them, though he did so only after every other Fed meeting. Warsh’s predecessor, Jerome Powell, shifted to holding them after every meeting.
Such steps are a sharp contrast with the 1990s, when Greenspan never explained a Fed decision, on the record, to reporters. Warsh could ultimately dial back some of the Fed’s increased transparency.
“This is a big change in how the Fed has conducted itself since the (2008-2009) global financial crisis,” Matthew Luzzetti, chief U.S. economist at Deutsche Bank, said. “Since then there has been a one-way train to greater communication, more transparency, and more forward guidance. Warsh has now put that train in reverse.”
Previous Fed chairs, starting with Bernanke, have seen a clear benefit to more communication: It helps guide the markets in the direction the Fed wants. Fed officials control a short-term interest rate, but the rates that affect the economy — such as the yield on the 10-year Treasury — are heavily influenced by investors’ expectations for inflation and economic growth. By telegraphing their next moves, policymakers can cause those longer-term rates to change even before the Fed adjusts its own benchmark rate.
Yet Warsh’s view is that financial markets have become too dependent on Fed guidance. Instead, he wants investors to gauge where the Fed may move next by examining economic data and making their own judgments, which the Fed can then consider as part of their assessments of where the economy is headed.
“Financial market prices are probably the most important source of information to guide central bankers,” Warsh said at Wednesday’s news conference.
David Andolfatto, an economics professor at the University of Miami and former economist at the St. Louis Fed, said he agreed with Warsh that forward guidance has flaws. It can be easily upended by unexpected events, he said, such as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine or the Iran war.
But the chair should set out guidelines for how the Fed will react to unexpected events, Andolfatto said, or to challenges such as the persistent inflation it is grappling with now, yet Warsh so far hasn’t done so.
“I’m with him on dispensing with forward guidance, but you have to replace it with a contingency plan,” Andolfatto said. “It’s not enough to say, trust me, we’ll keep inflation at target.”
Ironically, Warsh’s decision to drop forward guidance may empower the other 18 members of the Fed’s rate-setting committee, Pearkes said. Those officials — six members of the Fed’s governing board, plus the presidents of the 12 regional Fed banks — frequently give public speeches, and their remarks will get even more attention as financial markets seek clues about what the Fed may do next.
A big challenge to Warsh’s approach will come if there is a sharp financial downturn or economic crisis, as occurred during the COVID pandemic. In those circumstances, economists said, forward guidance can play an important role calming markets.
“Whether it will stand the test of time and he will behave this way for five years is a very different question, but one that we’re going to have to wait for events to unfold to get an answer to,” Pearkes said.

Claude Guillemot, a co-founder of Assassin’s Creed maker Ubisoft alongside his four brothers, has died in a plane crash in France.
French media reported that Guillemot died on Friday evening when the Cessna 421 twin engine plane he was piloting crashed close to the aerodrome of the beach resort of La Baule in Western France where he has a vacation home. His instructor is reported to have died as well.
“Ubisoft learned with deep sadness of the death of Claude Guillemot, co-founder of the group and President of Guillemot Corporation, in an accident. Our thoughts are with his family and loved ones during this ordeal,” an Ubisoft representative said in a statement.
The entrepreneur and businessman and the unnamed plane instructor had reportedly set off from the city of Rennes for La Baule on Friday afternoon for the Fly In La Baule meeting gathering light airplane enthusiasts.
Claude Guillemot, who was 69, co-created video games specialist Ubisoft with brothers Michel, Yves, Gérard and Christian in their hometown of Carentoir in Brittany in 1986.
Kicking off with early games Zombi, Iron Lord, it steadily grew into one of the most influential game makers in the world with titles Assassin’s Creed, Rayman, Driver, Rabbids, Tom Clancy’s, and Watch Dogs.
He also led on the development of their other joint company Guillemot Corporation, specialized in gaming accessories and digital audio technology, which was created prior to Ubisoft in 1984.
In 2000, the brothers also formed Gameloft, which would go on to become a major player in downloadable video games for smartphones.
Claude Guillemot handed the day-to-day running of Guillemot Corporation to his son Valentin Guillemot in July 2025, appointing him CEO, but remained attached to the company in the role Chairman of the Board of Director and continued to guide its overall direction.
Over at Ubisoft, which is headed by brother Yves Guillemot, Claude Guillemot was on the board under the title of Deputy Chief Executive Officer but was not part of the day-to-day leadership team.

Three Democratic senators have urged the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to put the Paramount-Warner Bros. Discovery merger on pause over concerns about foreign investors controlling what would be one of the largest media companies in the United States.
In a joint letter to FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, Sens. Cory Booker, D- N.J., Adam Schiff, D-Calif., and Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., demanded he “must foreclose any attempt by Paramount to close this transaction” before an adequate review of the involved foreign investors is completed.
The lawmakers said the FCC must conduct this review to evaluate possible “national security threats posed by foreign government investment” in the $110 billion entity. If approved, the merger would bring CNN and CBS News under one corporate owner, further consolidating the news media landscape.
Paramount, led by CEO David Ellison, acknowledged in an April financial disclosure cited by the senators that foreign ownership in the new corporation will rise to “approximately 49.5 percent.” In that document, Paramount also said that all voting rights will be “controlled by the Ellison family through U.S. entities.”
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The document revealed that Saudi Arabia’s public investment fund and various entities based in the United Arab Emirates and Qatar would be equity holders.
Paramount told the FCC in April that this arrangement would not present “any national security, law enforcement, or foreign or trade policy concerns.”
The senators want a more rigorous check of what this level of foreign ownership would mean, telling Carr in their letter that he should not take the Ellison family’s statements “at face value.”
They argued that the FCC should reject Paramount’s petition for preemptive approval. Under Section 310 of the 1934 Communications Act, foreign individuals, companies and governments are generally prohibited from owning more than 25% of a U.S.-based firm that has an FCC-issued broadcast license.
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Booker, Schiff and Warren gave Carr a July 1 deadline to notify Paramount that the deal cannot close until the foreign investment review is completed.
The FCC’s pending approval is the largest regulatory hurdle in the way of the merger. The Department of Justice signaled last week it would not challenge Paramount’s bid to acquire Warner Bros.
The DOJ’s antitrust division concluded after an eight-month review that “the transaction is not likely to result in harm to competition or American consumers” with regard to on-demand streaming, linear television and studio development, and the production and distribution of films.
Warren criticized this decision by the DOJ and urged state attorneys general to continue fighting the transaction. California Attorney General Rob Bonta was already leading a coalition of states in preparing a lawsuit to block Paramount from adding Warner Bros. to its growing portfolio.
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More than 5,000 filmmakers and actors working in Hollywood signed an open letter in April furiously demanding that the merger be stopped. They argued that it would stifle competition and reduce job opportunities.
“Our industry is already under severe strain, in large part due to prior waves of consolidation. We have witnessed a steep decline in the number of films produced and released,” according to the petition. “We are deeply concerned by indications of support for this merger that prioritize the interests of a small group of powerful stakeholders over the broader public good.”

Big Tech’s AI buildout is moving from cash-flow story to bond-market story, and Kevin Warsh’s first Fed meeting just made that shift harder to ignore.
Nvidia doesn’t need the money. That is what makes its $25 billion bond sale the useful starting point. The chipmaker filed to sell investment-grade debt for the first time since 2021, then upsized the deal from $20 billion after investors put in more than $85 billion of orders, the Financial Times reported. Nvidia still has a balance sheet most companies would envy, and the proceeds are officially for general corporate purposes, including refinancing. But you don’t have to squint to see the bigger message. Even the company selling the picks and shovels of the AI boom wants more dry powder.
That is the part investors should sit with. AI is no longer just a capital spending line buried inside earnings calls from Microsoft, Amazon, Meta, Alphabet and Oracle. It is becoming a financing machine of its own. Morgan Stanley projects AI-linked global debt issuance will reach nearly $570 billion in 2026, according to figures cited by CNBC, after roughly $236 billion had already been sold by the end of May. This isn’t a few weaker companies borrowing because they ran out of cash. It is some of the largest companies in the world deciding that the data center race is too expensive, and too urgent, to fund only from operating cash.
Look at the names. Meta has already tapped the bond market for $25 billion. Oracle has done the same. Alphabet sold $20 billion of debt, including a rare 100-year sterling bond. Amazon has also lined up large new financing for AI infrastructure, with MarketWatch noting a $17.5 billion loan tied to the same buildout. These companies are not equal credit risks, and treating them as one giant Big Tech basket is lazy. Alphabet can absorb more pain than Oracle. Nvidia is in a different position again. But the direction is shared: the old cash-rich technology model is taking on more leverage to keep feeding AI capacity.
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Here’s the thing: shareholders who bought these businesses for fortress balance sheets now own something more sensitive to the price of money. CNBC’s analysis points to credit spreads already widening as issuance piles up. Oracle is the warning label. Moody’s rates it Baa2, only two notches above junk, and the company is expected to burn as much as $28 billion of free cash flow in 2026. Even stronger names are not immune. Alphabet and Meta can still borrow on good terms, but their free cash flow is being squeezed as capital expenditure climbs. If you own these stocks and never cared about Treasury yields, you need to start caring.
The timing is awkward because the Fed just stopped sounding friendly. Kevin Warsh, confirmed by the Senate on May 13 and now in Jerome Powell’s old chair, used his first policy meeting to keep rates at 3.5% to 3.75%, according to Kiplinger’s live account of the June meeting. That part was expected. The tone was not. Warsh stripped back forward guidance, said the Fed would deliver price stability, and left investors with less of the hand-holding they grew used to under Powell. The Financial Times called the debut hawkish after Treasury yields jumped and the S&P 500 fell 1.2%.
That matters in a very practical way. A data center financed at easy-money rates is one thing. A data center financed while the two-year Treasury yield is around 4% and the Fed is openly discussing the possibility of higher rates is another. Big Tech can still borrow. The June Nvidia deal proved there is plenty of demand for the strongest credits. But demand is not the same as cheap money, and cheap money is what made many AI spending plans look cleaner than they may really be.
There is also a circularity here that should make you uncomfortable. Cloud companies are borrowing to build data centers. Those data centers buy Nvidia chips. Nvidia is investing across the AI ecosystem and raising debt of its own. Investors then lend more because AI revenue growth looks unstoppable. That loop can work for a long time when cash flows keep arriving. It gets much less forgiving if customers delay projects, if power constraints slow construction, or if the promised productivity gains take longer to show up in actual profits.
Frankly, the market has been too willing to treat AI debt as a footnote because the borrowers have famous names. That is not analysis. A $25 billion bond sale from Nvidia is still a $25 billion bond sale. A company can be wildly profitable and still change the risk profile of its equity when it starts leaning harder on debt. The old technology trade was about growth, margins and cash. The new one adds duration, refinancing and central-bank policy to the same page.
Warsh has made that page harder to read. He has promised less forward guidance, not more, and half the Fed committee’s projections reportedly pointed to at least one rate increase this year. So the AI buildout now has two clocks running at once: the industry clock, where every company wants capacity before its rivals get it, and the bond-market clock, where every new issue depends on what investors think inflation and rates will do next. Nvidia got its deal done. The question is how many more companies can keep doing the same if the Fed refuses to make borrowing easier.