What happened? Renault has issued a press release Sunday evening stating that CEO Luca De Meo has resigned his position as CEO to ''pursue challenges outside the automotive sector''. De Meo''s departure will be effective from July 15th, 2025. Renault''s Board of Directors has initiated the process of appointing a new CEO. This appears to confirm a prior report in Le Figaro and Bloomberg that De Meo will leave Renault to take up the position of luxury firm Kering (owner of Gucci). BNPP Exane View: This will clearly come as a material negative surprise to Renault investors in our view, and leave the firm with no clear successor, and at a time of strategic uncertainty. The recent change of CFO (to Duncan Minto) also means the company does not have a seasoned 2nd in command to take the reins while a new CEO is sought, though Chairman Dominique Senard (former Michelin CEO) could well step up as interim CEO in our view. De Meo has been with Renault for 5 years, during which time he has revived the fortunes of Renault through a product led renaissance, capitalising on historic nameplates while taking bold decisions to separate the BEV operations (Ampere) from the legacy business, and to push ICE engine operations into a JV with Geely and Volvo Cars (Horse). His ''Renaul-ution'' strategy is now coming to a close, and a new ''Futurama'' plan was due to be presented by year-end. This now seems unlikely in our view. De Meo''s somewhat abrupt departure, with only 1 month''s notice, seems unusual in our view for a CEO, though we believe he is well qualified to take up the role at Kering given his strong branding and consumer understanding. His successor is not obvious to us, though Josep Maria Recasens could be a candidate, having recently been appointed as CEO of Ampere. Recasens was previously Chief Strategy Officer of Renault, and COO of Ampere. He joined Renault in 2021 from Seat, where he had worked with De Meo. We expect a materially negative share price...