Abstract
The spin polarization of the photoelectric current from ferromagnetic gadolinium is expected to decrease monotonically on increasing the photon energy hν from threshold to about 10 eV. However, it is found experimentally that a pronounced minimum in the polarization occurs at hν=6.5 eV. It is shown that this minimum is due to a quasielastic decay of the optically excited 4f8 state into a 5d band state.