Tony James’s family office hired a former money manager for Laurene Powell Jobs as the legendary dealmaker builds his personal holdings after leaving Blackstone Inc.
Daniel Forman joined Jefferson River Capital late last year as chief investment officer. He worked at Powell Jobs’s Emerson Collective for about four years, most recently as head of asset management after previously overseeing the firm’s fixed-income investments.
Forman and a representative for Jefferson River declined to comment.
James, 71, left Blackstone at the start of last year after about two decades at the private equity giant. He led the effort to take it public and helped transform Blackstone into one of the world's largest alternative-investment firms with more than $950 billion in assets. He was president as well as chief operating officer until 2018, when Jon Gray took over those posts.
Along the way James, a former Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette banker, became one of the richest people in finance worth about $4.3 billion. About a quarter of that is still tied up in Blackstone, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. He sold more than $1 billion of the New York-based company’s stock during 2021 when it reached a record high. It was his biggest annual disposal in at least a decade, bolstering the family office that he set up in 2016.
Ken Brown, who formerly worked for equipment manufacturer Roper Industries, has helped run New York-based Jefferson River in recent years, while onetime Credit Suisse Group AG executive Bill Helm joined in 2018 to make real estate investments in the Eastern U.S. The firm, named after a waterway that runs through the James family’s Montana ranch, has also invested in small private equity deals that wouldn't compete with Blackstone investments.
Jefferson River led a group of investors last year buying U.S. college bookstore operator Follett Higher Education and began the redevelopment of a North Carolina office building. It has also participated in venture capital funding rounds and made investments in sports and therapy businesses.
James’s departure from Blackstone was the latest sign of a changing of the guard at Wall Street’s storied leveraged buyout shops, leaving Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman, 75, as the lone holdout among a generation of billionaire founders who have recently passed the torch to a younger set of leaders.
He's not alone in setting up a family office to oversee his fortunes away from his primary business. Carlyle Group Inc. co-founder David Rubenstein makes personal investments through Declaration Capital, while Leon Black last year hired a former JPMorgan Chase & Co. executive for his venture capital allocations after stepping down as Apollo Global Management Inc.’s chief executive officer.
Family offices have boomed in number over the past two decades as discrete vehicles to manage the financial affairs of the world’s ultra-rich, partly fueled by surging fortunes in finance and technology. Wealthy individuals from other sectors are also taking more control of their wealth, with New Line Cinema founder Bob Shaye recently establishing his own family office, Lemoko Investments.
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.