‘Hank Who?’

He went on his tour of the industry in 2012 with Brian Nicholson, a vice president at Stripes Group. Nicholson, who joined the New York private-equity fund after co-founding a luxury menswear company named for a Cary Grant character, said the two of them stood out.

“Steve and I walk into a merchant-cash-advance business in midtown, and it’s a total boiler room with folks dialing for dollars,” said Nicholson, 32, who wouldn’t name the company. “Steve, in his tweed jacket, sweater and tie, begins talking about his tenure at Goldman and being a resource for ‘Hank’ during the financial crisis. The CEO responds, ‘Hank?’ as in ‘Hank who?’ It was a bizarre situation.”

Mandis worked on special projects for Henry “Hank” Paulson, the Goldman Sachs chief executive officer appointed Treasury Secretary by President George W. Bush, according to his book’s author note.

He also went downtown to one of the biggest loan brokers, Yellowstone Capital LLC. Its red-walled offices in the financial district used to be home to an illegal currency-trading shop run by a professional poker player.

Blue Blazer

Wearing a blue blazer, Mandis walked into a call center full of salesmen in jeans and t-shirts, according to David Glass, the firm’s co-founder, whose stint at a Long Island stock brokerage in the 1990s helped inspire the movie “Boiler Room.” Mandis said he had millions of dollars to invest in the industry and mentioned he taught at Columbia, Glass said. The meeting didn’t go well, he added.

“Most new players come into the business with high-finance backgrounds and have trouble adjusting to guys like me,” Glass said.

Mandis wouldn’t describe his visit to Yellowstone except to say that he met people who “would not traditionally work at a Goldman Sachs or a McKinsey.”
 

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