It was February 2007 and in a former military barracks on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, nearly 600 guests toasted with champagne while Rod Stewart sang at a private concert marking the 60th birthday of one of the most powerful men on Wall Street.
That man was Stephen SchwarzmanCEO and founder of Blackstone. Nobody at the party knew that, months later, that same night would go down in history as the symbol of everything that was going to go wrong on Wall Street.
A party that marked an era. That was not just any birthday party. Almost two decades later, there are still many who remember her as one of the most ostentatious.
Schwarzman, founder of Blackstone, rented the Park Avenue Armory in Manhattan, filled it with orchids, palm trees, and a life-size portrait of himself. According to the book ‘Davos Man‘ by Peter S. Goodman, comedian Martin Short entertained the evening, singer Patti LaBelle sang happy birthday and even Rod Stewart gave a private concert.
Among the almost 600 attendees were bankers, politicians and even a certain Donald Trump, then just another New York businessman.
An unforgettable party. HE esteem that the party cost between three and five million dollars. Today that figure seems modest next to other waste the kind that millionaires boast about, but in those years it was a significant waste.
Schwarzman later justified it as “a celebration with six hundred people we cared about.” Peccadillo for someone who had just pocketed $398.3 million in the 2006 fiscal year.
The expensive thing was not the party. However, the party came just four days after a key announcement. Blackstone had just closed the biggest real estate purchase in history until that moment, for 39,000 million dollars. Months later, the company went public. Schwarzman he pocketed nearly 700 million in cash, and was awarded a stake valued at about 9,000 million.
That cocktail of luxury and easy money caught the attention of the Senate. Legislators Max Baucus and Chuck Grassley presented what the press dubbed the “Blackstone Bill”. A regulations tailor-made for Schwarzman’s company that sought to raise taxes on private capital.
With the subprime crisis already upon us, Schwarzman ended up admitting that that party was “a little exaggerated”. He assured that he never wanted to become the symbol of the opulence of an era.
“I’m not rich,” he only had a net worth of 8 billion. With such a fortune, anyone would expect a certain comfort with the label of rich. But that wasn’t the case with Schwarzman.
As and how I collected The Wall Street JournalEven after the millionaire’s ostentatious birthday party, when asked about his lifestyle, the Blackstone CEO responded without hesitation: “I don’t feel like a rich person. Others see me as such, but I don’t. I feel the same as when I was a fifth-year associate and aspired to be a partner at Lehman. I haven’t changed… I’m still trying.”
The old excesses that no longer return the same. Perhaps displaying a certain nostalgia, ten years after that memorable party, Schwarzman celebrated his 70th. On this occasion, he did not skimp either.
There were camels, trapeze artists and a private concert by singer Gwen Stefani in Palm Beach, near Mar-a-Lago. The party almost happened without noise from the front pages of the newspapers. It was the Trump era and luxury no longer shocked anyone like before. Their neighbors Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner were among the guests.
The king of parties at 79. Today, with a fortune of 48 billion dollars, Schwarzman prepares a Halloween party at his English estate in Conholt Park. No camels or temples: just fireworks and two days of private meeting. Something quiet. chill.
The excesses of yesteryear, those that made Congress tremble, they no longer scare so much today. The billionaires of this decade are more discreet with their forms, although their wealth has increased tenfold. Today’s billionaires they spend the same or more than Schwarzman in 2007, they just don’t do the same ostentation. The difference is in the noise, not the money.
Image | Unsplash (Ophélie Bonavita), Flickr (World Economic Forum)
GIPHY App Key not set. Please check settings