Jeremy Warner: Deripaska, Rothschild and me

Outlook I seem to have joined George Osborne in incurring the wrath of the Rothschild dynasty. In yesterday's column, I wrote that it was reasonable to assume Oleg Deripaska, the Russian oligarch at the centre of the donations storm, was a client of Atticus Capital, the hedge fund group where Nat Rothschild is co-chairman. I assumed wrongly.

Mr Rothschild does indeed advise Mr Deripaska on various money-making capers, but this is in a personal capacity, and has nothing to do with Atticus. Nevertheless, the point I was trying to make seems reasonable enough.

The young Rothschild seems to have a greater sense of loyalty to Mr Deripaska than to his now presumably "former" friend, the shadow Chancellor George Osborne. I was only trying to ask the question of why, but money usually lies at the bottom of these things and in this case almost certainly does.

The Rothschilds are a money-making dynasty par excellence, and even after so many generations, it is still deep in the DNA. Mr Osborne's "offence" was to come between Nat Rothschild and his relationship with the Russian oligarch. There's naivity all round in this bizarre affair, but at least your humble columnist can still say what he wants.