The Last Tycoons: The Secret History of Lazard Frères & Co.

Cohan, William D.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0141036893 ISBN 13: 9780141036892

Publisher: Penguin, 2008

William D. Cohan's The Last Tycoons: The Secret History of Lazard Frères & Co. is the astonishing story of the world's most elite and legendary investment bank - and the men who reigned over it all.

For over 150 years Lazard Frères had stood apart from other Wall Street firms by offering ultra-wealthy clients the wisdom of its 'Great Men': from Felix Rohatyn, the escapee from Nazi-occupied France turned financial genius, to Michel David-Weill, the inscrutable French billionaire 'Sun King'; from Steve Rattner, the boy wonder from Long Island who clashed violently with the old guard, to larger-than-life CEO Bruce Wasserstein, 'Bid-Em-Up-Bruce', who broke with the bank's traditions and made himself billions in the process. They amassed unimaginable fortunes and would stop at nothing to make a deal, until their titanic egos started to jeopardize everything.

In The Last Tycoons William Cohan, himself a former high-level Wall Street banker, takes us into their mysterious and secretive world, telling a story of ruthless ambition, whispered advice, explosive feuds, glamorous mistresses, decadent excesses and unimaginable wealth.

'Spellbinding'
  Financial Times

'A definitive account ... it lives up to the billing'
  The Times

'Has sent a jolt through Lazard and the rest of Wall Street'
  Wall Street Journal

William D. Cohan was an award-winning investigative journalist before embarking on a seventeen-year career as an investment banker on Wall Street. His first book, The Last Tycoons, about Lazard, won the 2007 Financial Times/Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award and was a New York Times bestseller. His second book, House of Cards, also a bestseller, is an account of the last days of Bear Stearns & Co. He is also the author of Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World.

Review:

Riveting ... a genuine page-turner (Will Hutton)

Spellbinding (Financial Times)

A definitive account ... it lives up to the billing (The Times)

Has sent a jolt through Lazard and the rest of Wall Street (Wall Street Journal)

An epic (The New York Times)

Synopsis:

They amassed unimaginable fortunes and would stop at nothing to make a deal, until their titanic egos started to jeopardize everything. This is the astonishing story of Lazard Freres, the world's most elite and legendary investment bank - and the men who reigned over it all. For over 150 years Lazard Freres had stood apart from other Wall Street firms by offering ultra-wealthy clients the wisdom of its 'Great Men': from Felix Rohatyn, the escapee from Nazi-occupied France turned financial genius, to Michel David-Weill, the inscrutable French billionaire 'Sun King'; from Steve Rattner, the boy wonder from Long Island who clashed violently with the old guard, to larger-than-life CEO Bruce Wasserstein, 'Bid-Em-Up Bruce', who broke with the bank's traditions and made himself billions in the process.In "The Last Tycoons", William Cohan, himself a former high-level Wall Street banker, takes us into their mysterious and secretive world, telling a story of ruthless ambition, whispered advice, explosive feuds, glamorous mistresses, decadent excesses and unimaginable wealth.