Mark rich biography
How Marc Rich Got Insanely Rich, Broke The Law, And Lived A Life In Exile
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Controversial billionaire commodities trader Marc Rich has passed away today at the age of 78 at a hospital near his home in Switzerland.
Rich — who fled the U.S. in 1983 before being indicted for wire fraud and tax evasion — pioneered the spot oil market, amassing a fortune by evading international rules and embargoes.
He founded the company that would later become Glencore Xstrata, but he became truly infamous for trading with with apartheid-era South Africa, Iran, Cuba, and the Pinochet regime in Chile. The honey badger of 1970s commodities trading, Marc Rich just didn't care.
In a highly controversial move, President Clinton pardoned Rich on his last day in office in 2001.
To some, Rich was an all-star commodities trailblazer. To others, a greedy, exiled white-collar criminal.
Worth an estimated $2.5 billion, Rich was no doubt, well, rich. And he certainly had a crazy life.
Rich was born in Belgium and was a Holocaust survivor. Born to Jewish parents, Rich and his family fled Belgium in 1941.
Source: Wall Street Journal
Rich spent the rest of his childhood in the U.S. As a young man, he dropped out of NYU to start trading commodities at Phillip Brothers.
Source: New Statesman
He predicted the 1973 oil embargo. He bought up crude oil before the price hike, and sold on demand when the embargo was enacted. Rich left Phillip Brothers and opened a new commodities trading shop in Switzerland called Marc Rich + Co AG.
Source: New Statesman
Rich ignored UN rules on apartheid South Africa and imported tons of Iranian oil into the country. He made a boatload of cash.
Sou Swiss business journalist Daniel Ammann presents a remarkable revisionist view of an ingenious and notorious commodities trader in his new biography “The King of Oil: The Secret Lives of Marc Rich.” The fugitive who went into Swiss exile in 1983 to escape prosecution for tax evasion and trading with the enemy, and received an explosively controversial presidential pardon on Bill Clinton’s last day in office, finally gets his side of the story told, after decades of bad press that caricatured him as a villainous, traitorous and utterly immoral financier. Ammann seeks to set the story straight in a sympathetic yet scrupulously even-handed manner, basing his account on hours of rare interviews with the publicity-shy Rich and his associates, as well as information from many other sources familiar with Rich’s business career and his epic legal ordeals. In a guest article, noted author Joshua A. Lustig reviews Ammann’s book. In the course of his review, Lustig recounts Rich’s: upbringing; ascent at commodities trading firm Philipp Brothers; trading innovations; 1983 indictment by then-U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Rudy Giuliani; guilty plea; controversial pardon by Bill Clinton; and legacy. 2009 book by Daniel Ammann The King of Oil: The Secret Lives of Marc Rich is a non-fiction book by Swiss investigative journalist Daniel Ammann. The book was initially released on October 13, 2009 by St. Martin's Press. It became an international bestseller and was published in nine languages. The book focuses on the biography of Marc Rich, a prominent international financier and commodity trader, who became a billionaire in the 1970s, arguably inventing the spot market for oil, grain, and metals. His Switzerland-based corporation Marc Rich + Co. AG actively traded with the apartheid regime of South Africa, Iran under Ayatollah Khomeini, Cuba, Nigeria under dictator Sani Abacha, China, the Soviet Union, and later Russia. Indicted on some 65 criminal counts, including income tax evasion, wire fraud, racketeering, and trading with Iran during the oil embargo, Rich, nevertheless, received a widely criticized presidential pardon from U.S. President Bill Clinton on his last day in office. Bloomberg named the book one of the best business books of the year and called it a "must-read". The Daily Beast called it a "journalistic coup". A reviewer of The New York Times wrote "the usually tight-lipped Mr. Rich gave an extensive account of his oil trading".Le Monde commented "The book reads like a thriller". A reviewer of Kirkus Reviews stated "A walking-on-eggshells attempt to shed light on arguably the most influential oil trader of our time... A flawed biography that reveals more about capitalist societies’ willful ignorance and ethical conundrums than the secret lives of its inscrutable subject." A reviewer of Publishers Weekly commented "An empathetic look at the notorious Marc Rich, one of the most successful and controversial commodities traders in American commodities trader (1934–2013) Marc Rich Marcell David Reich Antwerp, Belgium Lucerne, Switzerland Denise Eisenberg Gisela Rossi Marc Rich (born Marcell David Reich; December 18, 1934 – June 26, 2013) was an international commoditiestrader, financier, and businessman. He founded the commodities company Glencore, and was later indicted in the United States on federal charges of tax evasion, wire fraud, racketeering, and making oil deals with Iran during the Iran hostage crisis. He fled to Switzerland at the time of the indictment and never returned to the United States. He received a widely criticized presidential pardon from President Bill Clinton, on his last day in office; Rich's ex-wife Denise had made large donations to the Democratic Party. Rich was born in 1934 to a Jewish family in Antwerp, Belgium. In 1941 his parents emigrated with their son to the United States to escape the Nazis. They traveled via Vichy France, Spain, Portugal, and the liner Serpa Pinto. His father opened a jewelry store in Kansas City, Missouri, then moved the family to Queens, New York City in 1950, where he started a company that imported Bengalijute to make burlap bags, and later started a business trading agricultural products and helped found the American Bolivian Bank (Banco Boliviano Americano S.A). Rich attended high school at the Rhodes Preparatory School in Manhattan.[9&
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Synopsis
Reception
Marc Rich
Born
(1934-12-18)December 18, 1934Died June 26, 2013(2013-06-26) (aged 78) Citizenship Belgium, Bolivia, United States, Israel, Spain Occupation Founder of Glencore Known for Banking, trading activities Spouses Early life