When business executives quiz Lazard investment banker Matthieu Pigasse about the future of the euro zone, he likes to pull out his iPad and play a rock song titled "Dirt."
The video features a black-and-white clip of young protesters clashing with police and the lyrics "Dollar is not your friend."
The French Mr. Pigasse is advising the Greek government on how to renegotiate its mountain of debt. His message to Greece's private creditors: Help Athens or European anarchy breaks out.
"We need to share the burden," the 43-year-old vice-chairman of Lazard Europe said in an interview in the company's Paris office, "Greece has made big sacrifices."
In France, Mr. Pigasse, a one-time guitar player, has shot to fame as the self-marketed rock star of finance. He co-owns the left-leaning French newspaper Le Monde, listens to punk rock in the office and, despite working for one of the most storied names in finance, says he wants a social revolution against the "conservative status quo."
Now Mr. Pigasse is a key player in a backroom European gig at a time when the fate of the monetary union hangs in the balance. His prescription is closely linked to his client's survival: greater European integration; make the European Central Bank more like the U.S. Federal Reserve, which can bankroll the government; and most of all, don't expel any country from the euro zone.
Last week, Mr. Pigasse and his debt-advisory team met with Greek officials in Brussels to work on the practical elements of a plan under which private-sector investors will write off 50% of €206 billion ($277 billion) of Greek sovereign debt they hold. The government, not Mr. Pigasse, will pitch the details of the plan to private investors.
Advising Athens is no walk in the park. A previous debt-restructuring plan fell apart over the summer as it became clear it wouldn't be sufficient. Just three weeks ago, then-Prime Minister George Papandreou surprised everybody—including Mr. Pigasse—with a proposal for a referendum on whether Greece wanted to stay part of the euro zone. Mr. Papandreou lost his job and the referendum plan was scrapped. Mr. Pigasse wouldn't comment on the referendum idea.
In France, Mr. Pigasse has followed a well-trodden path from the finance ministry to investment banker, gaining as many fans as detractors along the way. While he is energetic and bright, Mr. Pigasse's self-confident style, Socialist political leanings and hunger for media attention have alienated some executives and colleagues, according to people who work with him. "Banks are not used to hiring people who love themselves more than they love money," said one former colleague, who spoke on condition that he not be identified.
A spokeswoman for Mr. Pigasse declined to comment.
The son of a local newspaper publisher, Mr. Pigasse grew up in a village in Normandy. He graduated from ENA, France's top administrative school, before earning his spurs in the late 1990s working under then- Finance Minister Dominique Strauss-Kahn. In that job, he developed relationships with influential people who would later help propel him up the corporate ladder.
In 2002, Mr. Pigasse joined Lazard and took over a group that counsels developing nations on their finances. He travelled the world, helping several governments, including those in Iraq, Ecuador and Argentina, to restructure their debt. He said Greece's case is more complex because failure would affect the euro zone as a whole, rather than just one country.
Mr. Pigasse also advised his own employer. In 2005, he used relationships he built up while in the government to help orchestrate a deal in which French bank Caisse d'Epargne took a minority stake in Lazard. That deal helped Lazard move ahead with an initial public offering. Cash raised through the IPO enabled Bruce Wasserstein, then head of the bank, to buy out the firm's chairman and biggest shareholder, Michel David-Weill.
Mr. Pigasse cemented his reputation within Lazard as a forceful negotiator by helping to orchestrate several multibillion-euro deals, including a $37.98 billion merger between utilities Suez SA and Gaz de France SA, and the creation of the investment bank Natixis SA, now a unit of Groupe BPCE. Greek officials say that Mr. Pigasse has a tendency to choose a position and is often reluctant to compromise on it. Mr. Pigasse had no comment.
"He is a man of huge energy," said Stéphane Boujnah, managing director of France and Benelux at Spanish bank Banco Santander, who worked with Mr. Pigasse at the finance ministry. He "is blessed with a talent for pushing the limits to breaking point."
In recent years, Mr. Pigasse has bolstered his public reputation in France by developing his media interests and cultivating his contacts within the Socialist Party, which counts Mr. Strauss-Kahn amongst its members. In 2009 he bought music magazine Les Inrockuptibles, and a year later helped bail out the newspaper Le Monde with an undisclosed amount of cash.
He was recently named to the board of satellite TV business British Sky Broadcasting Group PLC, which is partly owned by News Corp., owner of The Wall Street Journal. In May, he helped organize a free rap and rock concert that attracted 80,000 people to central Paris to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the election of Socialist French President François Mitterrand.
While Lazard prizes its image as a behind-the-scenes adviser to the powerful, Mr. Pigasse actively seeks the spotlight. He has his own public-relations adviser, and several magazines, including Vogue Italy, have published large photos of him, two shirt buttons undone, and quoted his love of British punk band The Clash in enthusiastic profiles.
Asked how he fits in his diverse activities, he leaned back in a boardroom chair at Lazard's Paris office and replied: "I do banking by day, print media in the evening and rock by night."
Mr. Pigasse is helped by his ability to charm older members of France's elite. Pierre Bergé, the 81-year-old French industrialist who co-founded fashion house Yves Saint Laurent, recalled how Mr. Pigasse sold him the idea of investing in Le Monde in the space of a few minutes over dinner. "He was very impulsive and I admired that a lot," said Mr. Bergé, a prominent Socialist. Mr. Pigasse's atypical interests and hunger for success reminded him of his younger self, he added.
At Lazard, Mr. Pigasse is supported by higher-ups at the firm, including Bruno Roger, the 78-year-old veteran chairman of Lazard Paris, in part because of the high-profile business he brings in.
Mr. Pigasse described himself as a pro-market Socialist. He is a financier who wants more market regulation and a millionaire banker who doesn't own real estate or a car. "I don't see any contradiction here," he said. "I think you can defend ideas that are not, financially speaking, in your interest."
Mr. Pigasse has yet to play his rock video "Dirt" to officials in Greece. While the song, by a U.K. band called Wu Lyf, or World Unite! Lucifer Youth Foundation, may be relevant, they don't need reminding about social unrest, he says. "They can just look in the streets."
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