Nicolas Sarkozy Offered £200,000 Per Hour Job with Morgan Stanley

Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy has been offered the chance to earn £200,000 for just a single hour of work with Morgan Stanley.

If Sarkozy takes the bank's offer, revealed in French investigative weekly Le Canard Enchaine, he will receive the bumper sum for giving a 45-minute speech and posing for pictures for a further 15 minutes.

The scale of the payment reveals the lucrative avenues open to former world leaders after they leave office.

Should Sarkozy accept the job, he will be following a path well trod by former prime minister Tony Blair, who makes £2.5m a year from his role as an adviser to investment bank JP Morgan.

Sarkozy was president of France for five years, bringing in a monthly salary of £17,000, before he was defeated by socialist Francois Hollande.

French management agent Nicolas Teil of Confanim said: "[The fee] is very expensive compared to the rest of the market, but we shouldn't forget that he once directed the fifth biggest power in the world.

"As a headhunter I can see why a company would spend so much money for his economic expertise."

Since stepping down as prime minister in 2007, Blair has capitalised on his stature to make huge profits, with an estimated income of £20m a year coming from businesses including his financial advisory service, Tony Blair Associates, which works in Kazakhstan, China and Abu Dhabi.

While a great deal of Blair's business ventures are well publicisied, Teil said the situation would not be repeated in France.

"This is a very taboo subject in France at the moment," he said. "You will never get a former president boasting of having sold his services to a company as it would offend public opinion."

Sarkozy is still embroiled in a number of party financing and corruption investigations after losing his presidential immunity.