Podcast appearances and mentions of Michael Steinhardt

On today's episode, Clay Finck reviews Michael Batnick's book, Big Mistakes: The Best Investors and Their Worst Investments. One of the best ways to become a better investor is to learn from our own mistakes. The second best (and less costly) way is to study the mistakes of others. If you want to learn from the mistakes of the world's greatest investors, then this episode was made for you.IN THIS EPISODE YOU'LL LEARN:00:00 - Intro.01:24 - Lessons from Batnick's book from studying the mistakes of the world's greatest investors.02:18 - How Benjamin Graham lost substantial capital during the great depression.07:14 - How Jesse Livermore taught us to always limit the potential downside.12:49 - How Long-Term Capital Management went from billions in AUM to zero almost overnight.16:40 - Michael Steinhardt's mistake of stepping outside of his circle of competence.26:24 - What the endowment effect is.27:20 - Warren Buffett's biggest blunder.29:57 - How Bill Ackman became publicly attached to a short position that went against him.37:32 - How Stan Druckenmiller got suckered into the 1999 tech bubble.49:21 - The dark side of concentrated investing.54:50 - How Keynes transitioned from being a macro investor to a bottoms up value investor.Disclaimer: Slight discrepancies in the timestamps may occur due to podcast platform differences.BOOKS AND RESOURCESCheck out our TIP Mastermind Community.Michael Batnick's book, Big Mistakes.Check out our previous episode: WSB577: Valuation Masterclass w/ Aswath Damodaran or watch the video here.Follow Clay on Twitter.NEW TO THE SHOW?Check out our We Study Billionaires Starter Packs.Browse through all our episodes (complete with transcripts) here.Try our tool for picking stock winners and managing our portfolios: TIP Finance Tool.Enjoy exclusive perks from our favorite Apps and Services.Stay up-to-date on financial markets and investing strategies through our daily newsletter, We Study Markets.Learn how to better start, manage, and grow your business with the best business podcasts.P.S The Investor's Podcast Network is excited to launch a subreddit devoted to our fans in discussing financial markets, stock picks, questions for our hosts, and much more! Join our subreddit r/TheInvestorsPodcast today!SPONSORSInvest in Bitcoin with confidence. Get $5 in Bitcoin when you invest $100 with River.Reach the world's largest audience with Linkedin, the place to B2B. Plus, enjoy a $100 credit on your next ad campaign!Invest in some of the top private, pre-IPO companies in the world with Fundrise.Experience real language learning for real conversations with Babbel. Get 55% off your Babbel subscription today.Send, spend, and receive money around the world easily with Wise.Be confident that you'll be small businessing at your best with support designed to help you reach your goals. Book an appointment with a TD Small Business Specialist today.Start, run, and grow your business without the struggle. Be in control of every sales channel with Shopify. Sign up for a $1 per month trial period today.Choose Toyota for your next vehicle – SUVs that are known for their reliability and longevity, making them a great investment. Plus, Toyotas now have more advanced technology than ever before, maximizing that investment with a comfortable and connected drive.Beat FOMO and move faster than the market with AlphaSense.Get a customized solution for all of your KPIs in one efficient system with one source of truth. Download NetSuite's popular KPI Checklist, designed to give you consistently excellent performance for free.Learn how Principal Financial can help you find the right benefits and retirement plan for your team today.Support our free podcast by supporting our sponsors.HELP US OUT!Help us reach new listeners by leaving us a rating and review on Apple Podcasts! It takes less than 30 seconds, and really helps our show grow, which allows us to bring on even better guests for you all! Thank you – we really appreciate it!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Rebecca Hotsko talks to Milton Berg about his shift from fundamental to technical analysis, his critiques of value investing, his use of market indicators to identify turning points, and much, much more! Milton Berg, CFA, is the CEO and Chief Investment Strategist of MB Advisors, LLC. He has worked in the financial services industry since 1978 and began his career as a Commodities Analyst and Trader at Swiss-based Erlanger and Company. He has worked with well-known titans of the hedge fund world including Michael Steinhardt, George Soros, and Stanley Druckenmiller. IN THIS EPISODE, YOU'LL LEARN:00:00 - Intro.02:30 - Why Milton transitioned from being a fundamental investor, studying Benjamin Graham and David Dodd, to a technical analyst. 10:49 - What drives market prices in the short term and long term, and are they random?16:25 - Milton's criticisms about value investing and learning from studying Benjamin Graham. 34:54 - How his investment strategy works, which is centered around identifying significant turning points in the market. 35:06 - What indicators he uses to assess whether the market is at a turning point. 45:25 - Whether Milton believes we are near a turning point today and the market has already seen its bottom. Is it possible to time the market? 01:00:33 - Advice on the most important factors that long term investors should focus on. *Disclaimer: Slight timestamp discrepancies may occur due to podcast platform differences.BOOKS AND RESOURCESCheck out: MiltonBerg.com.Related Episode: Listen to MI255: Navigating Bubble 3.0: Is This Time Different? w/ David Hay. or watch the video.NEW TO THE SHOW?Check out our Millennial Investing Starter Packs.Browse through all our episodes (complete with transcripts) here.Try Robert and Rebecca's favorite tool for picking stock winners and managing our portfolios: TIP Finance.Enjoy exclusive perks from our favorite Apps and Services.Stay up-to-date on financial markets and investing strategies through our daily newsletter, We Study Markets.Learn how to better start, manage, and grow your business with the best business podcasts.P.S The Investor's Podcast Network is excited to launch a subreddit devoted to our fans in discussing financial markets, stock picks, questions for our hosts, and much more! Join our subreddit r/TheInvestorsPodcast today!SPONSORSGet a FREE audiobook from Audible.Instead of trying to time the market or pick single stocks, automate your investments and invest in a variety of companies with Betterment.What does happen when money and big feelings mix? Tune in to find out on the new podcast, Open Money, presented by Servus Credit Union.Partner with a specialized agency focused on making insurance as easy as possible for real estate investors. Take advantage of monthly reporting, monthly billing, and coverage for all phases of occupancy with National Real Estate Insurance Group.Enjoy soft, stretchy bottoms that last forever with birddogs. Use promo code INVESTING and get a free Yeti-style tumbler with every order.Apply for the Employee Retention Credit easily, no matter how busy you are, with Innovation Refunds.Support our free podcast by supporting our sponsors.Connect with Rebecca: Twitter | InstagramEmail: Rebecca@theinvestorspodcast.comConnect with Milton: TwitterSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Milton Berg, CFA (@BergMilton), the CEO and Director of Research of MB Advisors, joined Julia La Roche on episode 57 for a deep dive into his technical analysis, which was taped on February 16. YouTube video: https://youtu.be/x7ms5ildUCQ Berg focuses on "Turning Point Analysis,” where he looks for turning point ends of trends. For example, he called the market bottom on June 16. On the day this episode was recorded (February 16, 2023), Berg explained why February 2 may have marked an important turning point in the markets, suggesting a probable end to that uptrend and a correction at least for the short term. Berg also shared that his firm is 100% short, going from leveraged long, to just 100% long to flat, and now 100% short. Milton has been in the financial services industry since 1978, with an extensive background in various roles on the buy side. Milton founded MB Advisors in 2012 to address a need for high-quality independent research with a macro, technical and historical focus. Milton began his career as a Commodities Analyst and Trader at Swiss-based Erlanger and Company. In 1980, he was a Fund Manager at First Investors Corp. and managed a natural resource fund as well as an option writing fund. In 1984, he moved to Oppenheimer and managed three mutual funds, which were each ranked as the top performer over a five-year period by Lipper. Milton then became a Partner at Steinhardt, one of the earliest hedge funds on Wall Street. More recently, he has worked with well-known titans of the hedge fund world, including Michael Steinhardt, George Soros, and Stanley Druckenmiller (Duquesne). Milton's work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Barron's, and Institutional Investor, in addition to other media outlets. His groundbreaking report “The Boundaries of Technical Analysis” was published in the summer of 2008 in the MTA's Journal of Technical Analysis. His 2015 research report “Approach to the Markets” outlines his method for analyzing the stock market. Milton has held a Chartered Financial Analyst designation since 1979. The Institute for Economic Research named Milton as the Mutual Fund Manager of the Year in 1987 given his performance during the crash. That same year, Milton was jointly named with Stanley Druckenmiller as Mutual Fund Manager of the Year by Sylvia Porter's Personal Finance Magazine. He has a forthcoming book “Milton Berg's Guide to Technical Analysis and the Stock Market" 0:00 Intro 0:31 Background from fundamental analysis to technical analysis 2:00 Approach to technical analysis 2:44 False assumption that stocks do well over the long term 3:50 More you stray from capitalism the more likely stocks won't perform as well 5:08 Capital gains tax is an error 6:50 Debt situation 8:50 Study of the Dow 10:00 What happened in the past will not necessarily happen in the future 10:15 Emergence of the Fed changed nature of the economy 10:54 Called market bottom on June 16 17:40 Yield curve 18:30 Coming out of the slowdown 18:50 Bullish for the year, projection of 4650 in the S&P 19:04 Turning point analysis 19:28 February 2 was a turning point 24:50 Something happened on Feb. 2 that might signal the end of the rally 36:00 Reason we had a great bull market 36:40 Bonds 39:00 Missing bull market signals 47:46 Why had stocks ignored Fed's tightening moves? 48:00 Maybe the real decline begins now 49:39 Gold 52:40 Bitcoin is a fiction

Over the past week, news broke that the novels of Roald Dahl were being rewritten to match modern sensibilities and remove language that some people have deemed offensive. These changes—which came at the behest of the Roald Dahl Story Company and Puffin, the books' publishing house—were ostensibly made to make the books better representative of, and more approachable for, diverse audiences. While the publishers can rewrite the book, however, they can't rewrite history: namely, that Dahl himself was a self-proclaimed antisemite. Is changing a few words an effective cover-up for the author's more problematic ideals? To get to the core of the issue, we're joined by YA author Joanne Levy. Dedicated Bonjour Chai listeners may recall Levy from her participation in our book club in November 2021. Plus, Avi and Phoebe chat about Michael Steinhardt's tarnished legacy and Phoebe's latest article on the intersection between feminism and aging. What we talked about Read Phoebe's article "Hag feminism is the future" at Unherd Read about Michael Steinhardt's exile from the antiquities world at New York Magazine Hear Joanne Levy discuss her book I'm Sorry For Your Loss on Bonjour Chai in Nov. 2021 Credits Bonjour Chai is hosted by Avi Finegold and Phoebe Maltz Bovy. Zachary Kauffman is the producer and editor. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Socalled. The show is a co-production from The Jewish Learning Lab and The CJN, and is distributed by The CJN Podcast Network. To learn how to support the show by subscribing to this podcast, please watch this video.

Hundreds of Russian troops who refused to continue with the war in Ukraine are being forcibly held in basements and garages in occupied Luhansk, according to a new report published. Police in Pennsylvania said an officer shot a man's pet snake after it wrapped itself around his neck and would not let go. New York officials have returned stolen antiquities worth nearly $14 million to Italy, including dozens of artifacts seized from US billionaire Michael Steinhardt. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told Secretary of State Antony Blinken in a phone call earlier this week that if the State Department doesn't designate Russia as a state sponsor of terror, Congress will, according to a Politico report citing two sources familiar with the conversation.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

MAGOS DE LOS MERCADOS – PARTE 2 – MAYORÍA DE ACCIONES - Michael SteinhardtMAGOS DE LOS MERCADOS de Jack D. SchwagerMichael Steinhardt-El concepto de percepción variableUna disculpa a partir de los siguientes videos. Mi computadora tuvo unos problemas y al momento de llevarla a reparar la tuvieron que formatear y por tanto perder las grabaciones.Esta fue la única manera de seguir con la continuación del libro de momento. Espero tener de vuelta la computadora lo antes posible. ¡SALUDOS!

In this episode we speak to Jack Schwager. Jack is the author of the Market Wizards series of books and has been studying the best traders for decades. He has interviewed some of history's most successful traders and investors for the series, including Paul Tudor Jones, Steve Cohen, Joel Greenblatt, Michael Steinhardt and many others. We discuss the biggest lessons investors can learn from these legendary investors and get his take on on a variety of other topics including what makes a good interview, the impact of technology on trading and his outlook for the new Robinhood traders that have entered the market in recent years. We hope you enjoy the discussion. ABOUT THE PODCAST Excess Returns is an investing podcast hosted by Jack Forehand (@practicalquant) and Justin Carbonneau (@jjcarbonneau), partners at Validea. Justin and Jack discuss a wide range of investing topics including factor investing, value investing, momentum investing, multi-factor investing, trend following, market valuation and more with the goal of helping those who watch and listen become better long term investors. SEE LATEST EPISODES https://www.validea.com/excess-returns-podcast FIND OUT MORE ABOUT VALIDEA https://www.validea.com FOLLOW OUR BLOG https://blog.validea.com FIND OUT MORE ABOUT VALIDEA CAPITAL https://www.valideacapital.com FOLLOW JACK Twitter: https://twitter.com/practicalquant LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-forehand-8015094 FOLLOW JUSTIN Twitter: https://twitter.com/jjcarbonneau LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jcarbonneau

With Katie on a parental leave, Steve speaks with Herrick Feinstein's Victor Rocco about his firm's representation of the Republic of Turkey in litigation brought by Turkey to possess a millennia-old Anatolian marble statue (the Stargazer) owned by Michael Steinhardt and sold by him through Christie's. (We previously had counsel for Christie's and Steinhardt on the podcast.)  After a trial in the Southern District of New York, Turkey lost for the primary reason that they could not provide facts supporting their claim to ownership of the Stargazer, specifically that it was stolen from modern day Turkey after 1906. Turkey has appealed that decision, and Victor and Steve discuss the trial and Turkey's arguments on appeal.

Welcome to Watching Brief. As the name implies, each week Marc (Mr Soup) & Andy Brockman of the Pipeline (Where history is tomorrow's news) cast an eye over news stories, topical media and entertainment and discuss and debate what they find. Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/archaeosoup *** 0:00 Introduction 2:17 Following Up on Last Week 4:37 Michael Steinhardt & 180 Stolen Artefacts! 18:43 Comte de Paris & Banksy!? 37:44 Plans for Christmas Special *** Link of the Week: 'Archaeorant: Save British Archaeology': https://tinyurl.com/v8svt23u AI Produces Art Based on Prompts: https://app.wombo.art/ *** Links: The Sidon Bull's Head: Court Record Documents a Journey Through the Illicit Antiquities Trade: https://chasingaphrodite.com/2017/09/24/the-sidon-bulls-head-court-record-documents-a-journey-through-the-illicit-antiquities-trade/ D.A. Vance: Michael Steinhardt Surrenders 180 Stolen Antiquities Valued at $70 Million: https://www.manhattanda.org/d-a-vance-michael-steinhardt-surrenders-180-stolen-antiquities-valued-at-70-million/ IN THE MATTER OF AN APPLICATION FOR A WARRANT TO SEARCH THE PREMISES LOCATED AT THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART, 1000 5TH AVENUE, NEW YORK, NEW YORI 10028 ("THE TARGET PREMISES") https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/4059759/2017-09-22-Application-for-Turnover-Order.pdf *** Banksy offers to raise £10m to buy Reading prison for art centre: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2021/dec/05/bansky-offers-to-raises-10m-to-buy-reading-prison-for-art-centre Banksy backs Reading Gaol arts centre plan: https://www.museumsassociation.org/museums-journal/news/2021/12/banksy-backs-reading-gaol-arts-centre-plan/ Banksy pledges to help save Reading jail with stencil sale: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-berkshire-59535099 The Comte de Paris demands return of Château de Chantilly: https://www.tatler.com/article/jean-dorleans-chateau-de-chantilly-french-throne-hotel-fallout

Welcome to Watching Brief. As the name implies, each week Marc (Mr Soup) & Andy Brockman of the Pipeline (Where history is tomorrow's news) cast an eye over news stories, topical media and entertainment and discuss and debate what they find. Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/archaeosoup *** 0:00 Introduction 2:17 Following Up on Last Week 4:37 Michael Steinhardt & 180 Stolen Artefacts! 18:43 Comte de Paris & Banksy!? 37:44 Plans for Christmas Special *** Link of the Week: 'Archaeorant: Save British Archaeology': https://tinyurl.com/v8svt23u AI Produces Art Based on Prompts: https://app.wombo.art/ *** Links: The Sidon Bull's Head: Court Record Documents a Journey Through the Illicit Antiquities Trade: https://chasingaphrodite.com/2017/09/24/the-sidon-bulls-head-court-record-documents-a-journey-through-the-illicit-antiquities-trade/ D.A. Vance: Michael Steinhardt Surrenders 180 Stolen Antiquities Valued at $70 Million: https://www.manhattanda.org/d-a-vance-michael-steinhardt-surrenders-180-stolen-antiquities-valued-at-70-million/ IN THE MATTER OF AN APPLICATION FOR A WARRANT TO SEARCH THE PREMISES LOCATED AT THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART, 1000 5TH AVENUE, NEW YORK, NEW YORI 10028 ("THE TARGET PREMISES") https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/4059759/2017-09-22-Application-for-Turnover-Order.pdf *** Banksy offers to raise £10m to buy Reading prison for art centre: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2021/dec/05/bansky-offers-to-raises-10m-to-buy-reading-prison-for-art-centre Banksy backs Reading Gaol arts centre plan: https://www.museumsassociation.org/museums-journal/news/2021/12/banksy-backs-reading-gaol-arts-centre-plan/ Banksy pledges to help save Reading jail with stencil sale: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-berkshire-59535099 The Comte de Paris demands return of Château de Chantilly: https://www.tatler.com/article/jean-dorleans-chateau-de-chantilly-french-throne-hotel-fallout

Hedge fund billionaire and antiquities collector Michael Steinhardt will have to repatriate 80 objects in his collection, all collected illegally. This case shines a spotlight on the problem of looters who steal antiquities, the dealers who trade in them, and the collectors who hoard them. Host Felix Salmon is joined by antiquities researcher Christos Tsirogiannis of Aarhus University in Denmark, who worked with law enforcement on the Michael Steinhardt case. Editor's note: The original audio and web copy for this episode stated that Michael Steinhardt had to repatriate 80 stolen objects. The total is 180, not 80. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

US President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin met on Tuesday via video conference. At the top of their agenda: the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. In recent months, Russia has been building up its military presence on Ukraine's border. And on Wednesday, Germany gets a new chancellor and a new coalition government. After 16 years, Angela Merkel will be replaced by Olaf Scholz as the country's new leader. Plus, billionaire Michael Steinhardt has surrendered 180 stolen objects worth $70 million and has been barred for life from buying antiquities. This comes after a four-year multinational investigation found that his illegal purchases had been smuggled from 11 countries via 12 illicit networks. Every day, our incredible team brings you powerful human stories from diverse perspectives you can't hear anywhere else. Without your support, none of it would be possible. Help us unlock a matching gift of $67,000 by being one of 515 supporters giving $130, or $11 per month. Thank you for being a part of our fall drive, and making our work possible!

Lorch, Catrinwww.deutschlandfunk.de, Kultur heuteDirekter Link zur Audiodatei

Katie and Steve speak with veteran cultural property and art lawyer, Tom Kline, about his representation of Christie's and Michael Steinhardt in litigation brought by Turkey to possess a millennia-old Anatolian marble statue (the Stargazer) owned by Steinhardt and sold by him through Christie's. After a trial in the Southern District of New York, Turkey lost for the primary reason that they could not provide facts supporting their claim to ownership of the Stargazer, specifically that it was stolen from modern day Turkey after 1906.

Can Mitzvos be bought and sold? Can you pay someone to take your Aveiros? Is Dovid Lichtenstein’s purchase of Michael Steinhardt’s mitzvah/olam haba valid? Can either party rescind the deal in Beis Din? ***Guest Hosted by Ari Wasserman *** Author of "Making it Work", "Making it ALL Work" (for women) and 10 other Seforim, Maggid Shiur, Yerushalayim with Reb Dovid Lichtenstein – founder and CEO of The Lightstone Group, purchaser of Michael Steinhardt’s “Birthright mitzvah” – 10:33 with Rabbi Manis Friedman – famed author, speaker, educator and Chabad Shaliach –28:09 with Rabbi Avi Wiesenfeld – Rosh Yeshiva of Beis Dovid and posek of Kav Halacha Beis Hora'ah – 38:24 with Rabbi Zalman Graus – Renowned Toen, Dayan and Mechaber Seforim  – 1:05:47 with Rabbi Yona Reiss – Av Beis Din of the CRC - 1:18:53 מראי מקומות    

Jack Schwager on the worlds greatest unknown traders.An interview with Jack Schwager, the author of The Market Wizards series of books, on his new book, Unknown Market Wizards. Jack has been involved in financial markets for over 45 years, he worked as a market analyst, a trader, managed institutional portfolios of managed accounts, and has written extensively on the futures industry.  He is most famous for his Market Wizards series of books, interviews with great traders in all financial markets. He has just released the newest installment of that series Unknown Market Wizards, which I reviewed in my Top Ten Books for Traders list earlier this week.  Schwager has interviewed Bruce Kovner, David Shaw, Paul Tudor Jones, Ed Seykota, Michael Steinhardt, William O'Neill, William Eckhardt, Monroe Trout, Stanley Druckenmiller, Mark Ritchie, Blair Hull, Larry Hite, Jim Rogers, Edward Thorp, Richard Dennis, and many more of the worlds most famous and highest returning traders.Patrick Boyle asks Jack about the characteristics these great traders have in common, what it takes to be a great trader, and what kind of returns do market wizards make in the long run. They discuss the efficient markets hypothesis, risk management, and how markets change over time.Patreon Page: https://www.patreon.com/PatrickBoyleOnFinanceUnknown Market Wizards by Jack Schwager:  https://amzn.to/3om6SHJJack Schwager Author Page on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3mBTq1LJack's Website: https://jackschwager.com/Patrick's Books:Statistics for the Trading Floor:  https://amzn.to/3eerLA0Derivatives for the Trading Floor:  https://amzn.to/3cjsyPFCorporate Finance:  https://amzn.to/3fn3rvC Visit our website: www.onfinance.orgFollow Patrick on Twitter Here: https://twitter.com/PatrickEBoyleFind Patrick on YouTube at: https://www.youtube.com/c/PatrickBoyleOnFinanceSupport the show (https://www.patreon.com/PatrickBoyleOnFinance)

This month on the podcast, we talk to Shoshanna Keats Jaskoll of Chochmat Nashim about the erasure of women in many Jewish publications, a worsening trend. Then, in our second segment, we discuss the influence of megadonors on the Jewish world in the wake of Michael Steinhardt’s #metoo scandal. Endorsements: Mimi endorses Uprooted: A Jewish Communal […] The post Women Erased and the Long Shadow of Megadonors appeared first on Jewish Public Media.

This month on the podcast, we talk to Shoshanna Keats Jaskoll of Chochmat Nashim about the erasure of women in many Jewish publications, a worsening trend. Then, in our second segment, we discuss the influence of megadonors on the Jewish world in the wake of Michael Steinhardt’s #metoo scandal. Endorsements: Mimi endorses Uprooted: A Jewish Communal […] The post Women Erased and the Long Shadow of Megadonors appeared first on Jewish Public Media.

This month on the podcast, we talk to Shoshanna Keats Jaskoll of Chochmat Nashim about the erasure of women in many Jewish publications, a worsening trend. Then, in our second segment, we discuss the influence of megadonors on the Jewish world in the wake of Michael Steinhardt’s #metoo scandal. Endorsements: Mimi endorses Uprooted: A Jewish Communal […] The post Women Erased and the Long Shadow of Megadonors appeared first on Jewish Public Media.

Hope everyone is recovering well from Purim! This week, Uri and Rivky talk about two recent scandals from the past week - the allegations against megadonor, Michael Steinhardt, for sexual harassment, and against the Sackler family, who have begun to face criticism for their alleged role in creating the opioid crisis (as founders of Purdue Pharma, the distributors of OxyContin). They ask, how do we judge Steinhardt and the Sacklers? What is the responsibility of nonprofit organizations, especially Jewish nonprofit organizations, when it comes to donors? Does it matter how slimy they are, or their money is? (Big thanks to listener Arielle for the title suggestion!) Related links: White House press conference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90G89gK0iD0 Michael Steinhardt: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/21/nyregion/michael-steinhardt-sexual-harassment.html Sacklers and the opioid crisis: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/26/health/opioids-purdue-pharma-oklahoma.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/25/arts/design/sackler-museums-donations-oxycontin.html Music: The Beatles - Money (That's What I Want): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CeWjEYhk7Xo

Late on a Thursday evening in February 2017, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s plane landed at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland for his first visit with President Donald Trump. A few hours earlier, the casino magnate Sheldon Adelson’s Boeing 737, which is so large it can seat 149 people, touched down at Reagan National Airport after a flight from Las Vegas. Adelson dined that night at the White House with Trump, Jared Kushner and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. Adelson and his wife, Miriam, were among Trump’s biggest benefactors, writing checks for $20 million in the campaign and pitching in an additional $5 million for the inaugural festivities. Adelson was in town to see the Japanese prime minister about a much greater sum of money. Japan, after years of acrimonious public debate, has legalized casinos. For more than a decade, Adelson and his company, Las Vegas Sands, have sought to build a multibillion-dollar casino resort there. He has called expanding to the country, one of the world’s last major untapped markets, the “holy grail.” Nearly every major casino company in the world is competing to secure one of a limited number of licenses to enter a market worth up to $25 billion per year. “This opportunity won’t come along again, potentially ever,” said Kahlil Philander, an academic who studies the industry. The morning after his White House dinner, Adelson attended a breakfast in Washington with Abe and a small group of American CEOs, including two others from the casino industry. Adelson and the other executives raised the casino issue with Abe, according to an attendee. Adelson had a potent ally in his quest: the new president of the United States. Following the business breakfast, Abe had a meeting with Trump before boarding Air Force One for a weekend at Mar-a-Lago. The two heads of state dined with Patriots owner Bob Kraft and golfed at Trump National Jupiter Golf Club with the South African golfer Ernie Els. During a meeting at Mar-a-Lago that weekend, Trump raised Adelson’s casino bid to Abe, according to two people briefed on the meeting. The Japanese side was surprised. “It was totally brought up out of the blue,” according to one of the people briefed on the exchange. “They were a little incredulous that he would be so brazen.” After Trump told Abe he should strongly consider Las Vegas Sands for a license, “Abe didn’t really respond, and said thank you for the information,” this person said. Trump also mentioned at least one other casino operator. Accounts differ on whether it was MGM or Wynn Resorts, then run by Trump donor and then-Republican National Committee finance chairman Steve Wynn. The Japanese newspaper Nikkei reported the president also mentioned MGM and Abe instructed an aide who was present to jot down the names of both companies. Questioned about the meeting, Abe said in remarks before the Japanese legislature in July that Trump had not passed on requests from casino companies but did not deny that the topic had come up. The president raising a top donor’s personal business interests directly with a foreign head of state would violate longstanding norms. “That should be nowhere near the agenda of senior officials,” said Brian Harding, a Japan expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “U.S.-Japan relations is about the security of the Asia-Pacific, China and economic issues.” Adelson has told his shareholders to expect good news. On a recent earnings call, Adelson cited unnamed insiders as saying Sands’ efforts to win a place in the Japanese market will pay off. “The estimates by people who know, say they know, whom we believe they know, say that we're in the No. 1 pole position,” he said. After decades as a major Republican donor, Adelson is known as an ideological figure, motivated by his desire to influence U.S. policy to help Israel. “I’m a one-issue person. That issue is Israel,” he said last year.  On that issue — Israel — Trump has delivered. The administration has slashed funding for aid to Palestinian refugees and scrapped the Iran nuclear deal. Attending the recent opening of the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem, Adelson seemed to almost weep with joy, according to an attendee. But his reputation as an Israel advocate has obscured a through-line in his career: He has used his political access to push his financial self-interest. Not only has Trump touted Sands’ interests in Japan, but his administration also installed an executive from the casino industry in a top position in the U.S. embassy in Tokyo. Adelson’s influence reverberates through this administration. Cabinet-level officials jump when he calls. One who displeased him was replaced. He has helped a friend’s company get a research deal with the Environmental Protection Agency. And Adelson has already received a windfall from Trump’s new tax law, which particularly favored companies like Las Vegas Sands. The company estimated the benefit of the law at $1.2 billion. Adelson’s influence is not absolute: His company’s casinos in Macau are vulnerable in Trump’s trade war with China, which controls the former Portuguese colony near Hong Kong. If the Chinese government chose to retaliate by targeting Macau, where Sands has several large properties, it could hurt Adelson’s bottom line. So far, there’s no evidence that has happened. The White House declined to comment on Adelson. The Japanese Embassy in Washington declined to comment. Sands spokesman Ron Reese declined to answer detailed questions but said in a statement: “The gaming industry has long sought the opportunity to enter the Japan market. Gaming companies have spent significant resources there on that effort and Las Vegas Sands is no exception.” Reese added: “If our company has any advantage it would be because of our significant Asian operating experience and our unique convention-based business model. Any suggestion we are favored for some other reason is not based on the reality of the process in Japan or the integrity of the officials involved in it.” With a fortune estimated at $35 billion, Adelson is the 21st-richest person in the world, according to Forbes. In August, when he celebrated his 85th birthday in Las Vegas, the party stretched over four days. Adelson covered guests’ expenses. A 92-year-old Tony Bennett and the Israeli winner of Eurovision performed for the festivities. He is slowing down physically; stricken by neuropathy, he uses a motorized scooter to get around and often stands up with the help of a bodyguard. He fell and broke three ribs while on a ferry from Macau to Hong Kong last November. Yet Adelson has spent the Trump era hustling to expand his gambling empire. With Trump occupying the White House, Adelson has found the greatest political ally he’s ever had. “I would put Adelson at the very top of the list of both access and influence in the Trump administration,” said Craig Holman of the watchdog group Public Citizen. “I’ve never seen anything like it before, and I’ve been studying money in politics for 40 years.” ***** Adelson grew up poor in Boston, the son of a cabdriver with a sixth-grade education. According to his wife, Adelson was beaten up as a kid for being Jewish. A serial entrepreneur who has started or acquired more than 50 different businesses, he had already made and lost his first fortune by the late 1960s, when he was in his mid-30s. It took him until the mid-1990s to become extraordinarily rich. In 1995, he sold the pioneering computer trade show Comdex to the Japanese conglomerate SoftBank for $800 million. He entered the gambling business in earnest when his Venetian casino resort opened in 1999 in Las Vegas. With its gondola rides on faux canals, it was inspired by his honeymoon to Venice with Miriam, who is 12 years younger than Adelson. It’s been said that Trump is a poor person’s idea of a rich person. Adelson could be thought of as Trump’s idea of a rich person. A family friend recalls Sheldon and Miriam’s two sons, who are now in college, getting picked up from school in stretch Hummer limousines and his home being so large it was stocked with Segway transporters to get around. A Las Vegas TV station found a few years ago that, amid a drought, Adelson’s palatial home a short drive from the Vegas Strip had used nearly 8 million gallons of water in a year, enough for 55 average homes. Adelson will rattle off his precise wealth based on the fluctuation of Las Vegas Sands’ share price, said his friend the New York investor Michael Steinhardt. “He’s very sensitive to his net worth,” Steinhardt said. Trump entered the casino business several years before Adelson. In the early 1990s, both eyed Eilat in southern Israel as a potential casino site. Neither built there. Adelson “didn’t have a whole lot of respect for Trump when Trump was operating casinos. He was dismissive of Trump,” recalled one former Las Vegas Sands official. In an interview in the late ’90s, Adelson lumped Trump with Wynn: “Both of these gentlemen have very big egos,” Adelson said. “Well, the world doesn't really care about their egos.” Today, in his rare public appearances, Adelson has a grandfatherly affect. He likes to refer to himself as “Self” (“I said to myself, ‘Self …’”). He makes Borscht Belt jokes about his short stature: “A friend of mine says, ‘You’re the tallest guy in the world.’ I said, ‘How do you figure that?’ He says, ‘When you stand on your wallet.’” By the early 2000s, Adelson’s Las Vegas Sands had surpassed Trump’s casino operations. While Trump was getting bogged down in Atlantic City, Adelson’s properties thrived. When Macau opened up a local gambling monopoly, Adelson bested a crowded field that included Trump to win a license. Today, Macau accounts for more than half of Las Vegas Sands’ roughly $13 billion in annual revenue. Trump’s casinos went bankrupt, and now he is out of the industry entirely. By the mid-2000s, Trump was playing the role of business tycoon on his reality show, “The Apprentice.” Meanwhile, Adelson aggressively expanded his empire in Macau and later in Singapore. His company’s Moshe Safdie-designed Marina Bay Sands property there, with its rooftop infinity pool, featured prominently in the recent hit movie “Crazy Rich Asians.” While their business trajectories diverged, Adelson and Trump have long shared a willingness to sue critics, enemies and business associates. Multiple people said they were too afraid of lawsuits to speak on the record for this story. In 1989, after the Nevada Gaming Control Board conducted a background investigation of Adelson, it found he had already been personally involved in around 100 civil lawsuits, according to the book “License to Steal,” a history of the agency. That included matters as small as a $600 contractual dispute with a Boston hospital. The lawsuits have continued even as Adelson became so rich the amounts of money at stake hardly mattered. In one case, Adelson was unhappy with the quality of construction on one of his beachfront Malibu, California, properties and pursued a legal dispute with the contractor for more than seven years, going through a lengthy series of appeals and cases in different courts. Adelson sued a Wall Street Journal reporter for libel over a single phrase — a description of him as “foul-mouthed” — and fought the case for four years before it was settled, with the story unchanged. In a particularly bitter case in Massachusetts Superior Court in the 1990s, his sons from his first marriage accused him of cheating them out of money. Adelson prevailed. Adelson rarely speaks to the media any more, with occasional exceptions for friendly business journalists or on stage at conferences, usually interviewed by people to whom he has given a great deal of money. “He keeps a very tight inner circle,” said a casino industry executive who has known Adelson for decades. Adelson declined to comment for this story. ******* Adelson once told a reporter of entering the casino business late in life, “I loved being an outsider.” For nearly a decade he played that role in presidential politics, bankrolling the opposition to the Obama administration. As with some of his early entrepreneurial forays, he dumped money for little return, his political picks going bust. In 2008, he backed Rudy Giuliani. As America’s Mayor faded, he came on board late with the John McCain campaign. In 2012, he almost single-handedly funded Newt Gingrich’s candidacy. Gingrich spent a few weeks atop the polls before his candidacy collapsed. Adelson became a late adopter of Mitt Romney. In 2016, the Adelsons didn’t officially endorse a candidate for months. Trump used Adelson as a foil, an example of the well-heeled donors who wielded outsized influence in Washington. “Sheldon or whoever — you could say Koch. I could name them all. They’re all friends of mine, every one of them. I know all of them. They have pretty much total control over the candidate,” Trump said on Fox News in October 2015. “Nobody controls me but the American public.” In a pointed tweet that month, Trump said: “Sheldon Adelson is looking to give big dollars to [Marco] Rubio because he feels he can mold him into his perfect little puppet. I agree!” Despite Trump’s barbs, Adelson had grown curious about the candidate and called his friend Steinhardt, who founded the Birthright program that sends young Jews on free trips to Israel. Adelson is now the program’s largest funder. “I called Kushner and I said Sheldon would like to meet your father-in-law,” Steinhardt recalled. “Kushner was excited.” Trump got on a plane to Las Vegas. “Sheldon has strong views when it comes to the Jewish people; Trump recognized that, and a marriage was formed.” Trump and his son-in-law Kushner courted Adelson privately, meeting several times in New York and Las Vegas. “Having Orthodox Jews like Jared and Ivanka next to him and so many common people in interest gave a level of comfort to Sheldon,” said Ronn Torossian, a New York public relations executive who knows both men. “Someone who lets their kid marry an Orthodox Jew and then become Orthodox is probably going to stand pretty damn close to Israel.” Miriam Adelson, a physician born and raised in what became Israel, is said to be an equal partner in Sheldon Adelson’s political decisions. He has said the interests of the Jewish state are at the center of his worldview, and his views align with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-of-center approach to Iran and Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories. Adelson suggested in 2014 that Israel doesn’t need to be a democracy. “I think God didn’t say anything about democracy,” Adelson said. “He didn’t talk about Israel remaining as a democratic state.” On a trip to the country several years ago, on the eve of his young son’s bar mitzvah, Adelson said, “Hopefully he’ll come back; his hobby is shooting. He’ll come back and be a sniper for the IDF,” referring to the Israel Defense Forces. On domestic issues, Adelson is more Chamber of Commerce Republican than movement conservative or Trumpian populist. He is pro-choice and has called for work permits and a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, a position sharply at odds with Trump’s. While the Koch brothers, his fellow Republican megadonors, have evinced concern over trade policy and distaste for Trump, Adelson has proved flexible, putting aside any qualms about Trump’s business acumen or ideological misgivings. In May 2016, he declared in a Washington Post op-ed that he was endorsing Trump. He wrote that Trump represented “a CEO success story that exemplifies the American spirit of determination, commitment to cause and business stewardship.” The Adelsons came through with $20 million in donations to the pro-Trump super PAC, part of at least $83 million in donations to Republicans. By the time of the October 2016 release of the Access Hollywood tape featuring Trump bragging about sexual assault, Adelson was among his staunchest supporters. “Sheldon Adelson had Donald Trump's back,” said Steve Bannon in a speech last year, speaking of the time after the scandal broke. “He was there.” In December 2016, Adelson donated $5 million to the Trump inaugural festivities. The Adelsons had better seats at Trump’s inauguration than many Cabinet secretaries. The whole family, including their two college-age sons, came to Washington for the celebration. One of his sons posted a picture on Instagram of the event with the hashtag #HuckFillary. The investment paid off in access and in financial returns. Adelson has met with Trump or visited the White House at least six times since Trump’s election victory. The two speak regularly. Adelson has also had access to others in the White House. He met privately with Vice President Mike Pence before Pence gave a speech at Adelson’s Venetian resort in Las Vegas last year. “He just calls the president all the time. Donald Trump takes Sheldon Adelson’s calls,” said Alan Dershowitz, who has done legal work for Adelson and advised Trump. Adelson’s tens of millions in donations to Trump have already been paid back many times over by the new tax law. While all corporations benefited from the lower tax rate in the new law, many incurred an extra bill in the transition because profits overseas were hit with a one-time tax. But not Sands. Adelson’s company hired lobbyists to press Trump’s Treasury Department and Congress on provisions that would help companies like Sands that paid high taxes abroad, according to public filings and tax experts. The lobbying effort appears to have worked. After Trump signed the tax overhaul into law in December, Las Vegas Sands recorded a benefit from the new law the company estimated at $1.2 billion. The Adelson family owns 55 percent of Las Vegas Sands, which is publicly traded, according to filings. The Treasury Department didn’t respond to requests for comment. Now as Trump and the Republican Party face a reckoning in the midterm elections in November, they have once again turned to Adelson. He has given at least $55 million so far. ***** In 2014, Adelson told an interviewer he was not interested in building a dynasty. “I want my legacy to be that I helped out humankind,” he said, underscoring his family’s considerable donations to medical research. But he gives no indication of sticking to a quiet life of philanthropy. In the last four years, he has used the Sands’ fleet of private jets, assiduously meeting with world leaders and seeking to build new casinos in Japan, Korea and Brazil. He is closest in Japan. Japan has been considering lifting its ban on casinos for years, in spite of majority opposition in polls from a public that is wary of the social problems that might result. A huge de facto gambling industry of the pinball-like game pachinko has long existed in the country, historically associated with organized crime and seedy parlors filled with cigarette-smoking men. Opposition to allowing casinos is so heated that a brawl broke out in the Japanese legislature this summer. But lawmakers have moved forward on legalizing casinos and crafted regulations that hew to Adelson’s wishes. “Japan is considered the next big market. Sheldon looks at it that way,” said a former Sands official. Adelson envisions building a $10 billion “integrated resort,” which in industry parlance refers to a large complex featuring a casino with hotels, entertainment venues, restaurants and shopping malls. The new Japanese law allows for just three licenses to build casinos in cities around the country, effectively granting valuable local monopolies. At least 13 companies, including giants like MGM and Genting, are vying for a license. Even though Sands is already a strong contender because of its size and its successful resort in Singapore, some observers in Japan believe Adelson’s relationship with Trump has helped move Las Vegas Sands closer to the multibillion-dollar prize. Just a week after the U.S. election, Prime Minister Abe arrived at Trump Tower, becoming the first foreign leader to meet with the president-elect. Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner were also there. Abe presented Trump with a gilded $3,800 golf driver. Few know the details of what the Trumps and Abe discussed at the meeting. In a break with protocol, Trump’s transition team sidelined the State Department, whose Japan experts were never briefed on what was said. “There was a great deal of frustration,” said one State Department official. “There was zero communication from anyone on Trump’s team.” In another sign of Adelson’s direct access to the incoming president and ties with Japan, he secured a coveted Trump Tower meeting a few weeks later for an old friend, the Japanese billionaire businessman Masayoshi Son. Son’s company, SoftBank, had bought Adelson’s computer trade show business in the 1990s. A few years ago, Adelson named Son as a potential partner in his casino resort plans in Japan. Son’s SoftBank, for its part, owns Sprint, which has long wanted to merge with T-Mobile but needs a green light from the Trump administration. A beaming Son emerged from the meeting in the lobby of Trump Tower with the president-elect and promised $50 billion in investments in the U.S. When Trump won the election in November 2016, the casino bill had been stalled in the Japanese Diet. One month after the Trump-Abe meeting, in an unexpected move in mid-December, Abe’s ruling coalition pushed through landmark legislation authorizing casinos, with specific regulations to be ironed out later. There was minimal debate on the controversial bill, and it passed at the very end of an extraordinary session of the legislature. “That was a surprise to a lot of stakeholders,” said one former Sands executive who still works in the industry. Some observers suspect the timing was not a coincidence. “After Trump won the election in 2016, the Abe government’s efforts to pass the casino bill shifted into high gear,” said Yoichi Torihata, a professor at Shizuoka University and opponent of the casino law. On a Las Vegas Sands earnings call a few days after Trump’s inauguration, Adelson touted that Abe had visited the company’s casino resort complex in Singapore. “He was very impressed with it,” Adelson said. Days later, Adelson attended the February breakfast with Abe in Washington, after which the prime minister went on to Mar-a-Lago, where the president raised Las Vegas Sands. A week after that, Adelson flew to Japan and met with the secretary general of Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party in Tokyo. The casino business is one of the most regulated industries in the world, and Adelson has always sought political allies. To enter the business in 1989, he hired the former governor of Nevada to represent him before the state’s gaming commission. In 2001, according to court testimony reported in the New Yorker, Adelson intervened with then-House Majority Whip Rep. Tom DeLay, to whom he was a major donor, at the behest of a Chinese official over a proposed House resolution that was critical of the country’s human rights record. At the time, Las Vegas Sands was seeking entry into the Macau market. The resolution died, which Adelson attributed to factors other than his intervention, according to the magazine. In 2015, he purchased the Las Vegas Review-Journal, the state’s largest newspaper, which then published a lengthy investigative series on one of Adelson’s longtime rivals, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, which runs a convention center that competes with Adelson’s. (The paper said Adelson had no influence over its coverage.) In Japan, Las Vegas Sands’ efforts have accelerated in the last year. Adelson returned to the country in September 2017, visiting top officials in Osaka, a possible casino site. In a show of star power in October, Sands flew in David Beckham and the Eagles’ Joe Walsh for a press conference at the Palace Hotel Tokyo. Beckham waxed enthusiastic about his love of sea urchin and declared, "Las Vegas Sands is creating fabulous resorts all around the world, and their scale and vision are impressive.” Adelson appears emboldened. When he was in Osaka last fall, he publicly criticized a proposal under consideration to cap the total amount of floor space devoted to casinos in the resorts that have been legalized. In July, the Japanese Diet passed a bill with more details on what casinos will look like and laying out the bidding process. The absolute limit on casino floor area had been dropped from the legislation. Meanwhile, the Trump administration has made an unusual personnel move that could help advance pro-gambling interests. The new U.S. ambassador, an early Trump campaign supporter and Tennessee businessman named William Hagerty, hired as his senior adviser an American executive working on casino issues for the Japanese company SEGA Sammy. Joseph Schmelzeis left his role as senior adviser on global government and industry affairs for the company in February to join the U.S. Embassy. (He has not worked for Sands.) A State Department spokesperson said that embassy officials had communicated with Sands as part of “routine” meetings and advice provided to members of the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan. The spokesperson said that “Schmelzeis is not participating in any matter related to integrated resorts or Las Vegas Sands.”  Japanese opposition politicians have seized on the Adelson-Trump-Abe nexus. One, Tetsuya Shiokawa, said this year that he believes Trump has been the unseen force behind why Abe’s party has “tailor-made the [casino] bill to suit foreign investors like Adelson.” In the next stage of the process, casino companies will complete their bids with Japanese localities. ****** Adelson’s influence has spread across the Trump administration. In August 2017, the Zionist Organization of America, to which the Adelsons are major donors, launched a campaign against National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster. ZOA chief Mort Klein charged McMaster “clearly has animus toward Israel.” Adelson said he was convinced to support the attack on McMaster after Adelson spoke with Safra Catz, the Israeli-born CEO of Oracle, who “enlightened me quite a bit” about McMaster, according to an email Klein later released to the media. Adelson pressed Trump to appoint the hawkish John Bolton to a high position, The New York Times reported. In March, Trump fired McMaster and replaced him with Bolton. The president and other cabinet officials also clashed with McMaster on policy and style issues. For Scott Pruitt, the former EPA administrator known as an ally of industry, courting Adelson meant developing a keen interest in an unlikely topic: technology that generates clean water from air. An obscure Israeli startup called Watergen makes machines that resemble air conditioners and, with enough electricity, can pull potable water from the air. Adelson doesn’t have a stake in the company, but he is old friends with the Israeli-Georgian billionaire who owns the firm, Mikhael Mirilashvili, according to the head of Watergen’s U.S. operation, Yehuda Kaploun. Adelson first encountered the technology on a trip to Israel, Kaploun said. Dershowitz is also on the company’s board. Just weeks after being confirmed, Pruitt met with Watergen executives at Adelson’s request. Pruitt promptly mobilized dozens of EPA officials to ink a research deal under which the agency would study Watergen’s technology. EPA officials immediately began voicing concerns about the request, according to hundreds of previously unreported emails obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. They argued that the then-EPA chief was violating regular procedures. Pruitt, according to one email, asked that staffers explore “on an expedited time frame” whether a deal could be done “without the typical contracting requirements.” Other emails described the matter as “very time sensitive” and having “high Administrator interest.” A veteran scientist at the agency warned that the “technology has been around for decades,” adding that the agency should not be “focusing on a single vendor, in this case Watergen.” Officials said that Watergen’s technology was not unique, noting there were as many as 70 different suppliers on the market with products using the same concept. Notes from a meeting said the agency “does not currently have the expertise or staff to evaluate these technologies.” Agency lawyers “seemed scared” about the arrangement, according to an internal text exchange. The EPA didn’t respond to requests for comment. Watergen got its research deal. It’s not known how much money the agency has spent on the project. The technology was shipped to a lab in Cincinnati, and Watergen said the government will produce a report on its study. Pruitt planned to unveil the deal on a trip to Israel, which was also planned with the assistance of Adelson, The Washington Post reported. But amid multiple scandals, the trip never happened. Other parts of the Trump administration have also been friendly to Watergen. Over the summer, Mirilashvili attended the U.S. Embassy in Israel’s Fourth of July party, where he was photographed grinning and sipping water next to one of the company’s machines on display. Kaploun said U.S. Ambassador David Friedman’s staff assisted the company to help highlight its technology.  A State Department spokesperson said Watergen was one of many private sponsors of the embassy party and was “subject to rigorous vetting.” The embassy is now considering leasing or buying a Watergen unit as part of a “routine procurement action,” the spokesperson said. A Mirilashvili spokesman said in a statement that Adelson and Mirilashvili “have no business ties with each other.” The spokesman added that Adelson had been briefed on the company’s technology by Watergen engineers and “Adelson has also expressed an interest in the ability of this Israeli technology to save the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans who are affected by water pollution.” ***** Even as the casino business looks promising in Japan, China has been a potential trouble spot for Adelson. Few businesses are as vulnerable to geopolitical winds as Adelson’s. The majority of Sands’ value derives from its properties in Macau. It is the world’s gambling capital, and China’s central government controls it. “Sheldon Adelson highly values direct engagement in Beijing,” a 2009 State Department cable released by WikiLeaks says, “especially given the impact of Beijing's visa policies on the company's growing mass market operations in Macau.” At times, Sands’ aggressive efforts in China crossed legal lines. On Jan. 19, 2017, the day before Trump took office, the Justice Department announced Sands was paying a nearly $7 million fine to settle a longstanding investigation into whether it violated a U.S. anti-bribery statute in China. The case revealed that Sands paid roughly $60 million to a consultant who “advertised his political connections with [People’s Republic of China] government officials” and that some of the payments “had no discernible legitimate business purpose.” Part of the work involved an effort by Sands to acquire a professional basketball team in the country to promote its casinos. The DOJ said Sands fully cooperated in the investigation and fixed its compliance problems. A year and a half into the Trump administration, Adelson has a bigger problem than the Justice Department investigation: Trump’s trade war against Beijing has put Sands’ business in Macau at risk. Sands’ right to operate expires in a few years. Beijing could throttle the flow of money and people from the mainland to Macau. Sands and the other foreign operators in Macau “now sit on a geopolitical fault line. Their Macau concessions can therefore be on the line,” said a report from the Hong Kong business consultancy Steve Vickers & Associates. A former Sands board member, George Koo, wrote a column in the Asia Times newspaper in April warning that Beijing could undercut the Macau market by legalizing casinos in the southern island province of Hainan. “A major blow in the trade war would be for China to allow Hainan to become a gambling destination and divert visitors who would otherwise be visiting Macau,” Koo wrote. “As one of Trump’s principal supporters, it’s undoubtedly a good time for Mr. Adelson to have a private conversation with the president.” It’s not clear if Adelson has had that conversation. According to The Associated Press, Adelson was present for a discussion of China policy at the dinner he attended with Trump at the White House in February 2017. In September, Trump escalated his trade war with China. He raised tariffs on $200 billion Chinese imports. China retaliated with tariffs on $60 billion of U.S. products. Adelson has said privately that if he can be helpful in any way he would volunteer himself to do whatever is asked for either side of the equation — the U.S. or China, according to a person who has spoken to him. ****** Torossian, the public relations executive, calls Adelson “this generation’s Rothschild” for his support of Israel. In early May, the Adelsons gave $30 million to the super PAC that is seeking to keep Republican control of the House for the remainder of Trump’s term. A few days later, Trump announced he was killing the Iran nuclear deal, a target of Adelson’s and the Netanyahu government’s for years. The following day, Adelson met with the president at the White House. Five days later, Adelson was in Israel for another landmark, the opening of the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem. Trump’s decision to move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem marked a major shift in U.S. foreign policy, long eschewed by presidents of both parties. Besides dealing a major blow to Palestinian claims on part of the city, which are recognized by most of the world, it was the culmination of a more than 20-year project of the Adelsons. Sheldon and Miriam personally lobbied for the move on Capitol Hill as far back as 1995. In an audience dotted with yarmulkes and MAGA-red hats, the Adelsons were in the front now, next to Netanyahu and his wife, the Kushners and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin. A beaming Miriam, wearing a dress featuring an illustration of the Jerusalem skyline, filmed the event with her phone. She wrote a first-person account of the ceremony that was co-published on the front page of the two newspapers the Adelsons own, Israel Hayom and the Las Vegas Review-Journal: “The embassy opening is a crowning moment for U.S. foreign policy and for our president, Donald Trump. Just over a year into his first term, he has re-enshrined the United States as the standard-bearer of moral clarity and courage in a world that too often feels adrift.” Adelson paid for the official delegation of Guatemala, the only other country to move its embassy, to travel to Israel. “Sheldon told me that any country that wants to move its embassy to Jerusalem, he’ll fly them in — the president and everyone — for the opening,” said Orthodox Jewish Chamber of Commerce CEO Duvi Honig, who was in attendance. Klein, the Zionist Organization of America president, was also there. The Adelsons, he said, “were glowing with a serene happiness like I’ve never seen them. Sheldon “said to me, ‘President Trump promised he would do this and he did it.’ And he almost became emotional. ‘And look, Mort, he did it.’

Reach Us Here: Doug- @DJDoug Strickland- @NiceGuyonBiz On Facebook: The Nice Guys Community page   Become a patron and support the podcast at www.Patreon.com/NiceGuys   Show Notes by Production Assistant - Anna Nygren   Intro Patreon “Nice Guy Community, keep the fuck up” - Love, Doug   UNITED Causing Divide… how ironic Doug and Strick enjoy seeing women wear yoga pants Strick's favorite yoga pose is pigeon Doug's favorite yoga pose is a toss up between puppy and cow Bananas actually don't cure cramps (Doug is wrong) Let's all talk about the elephant in the room, United Truth is, that the airplane company has the right to kick anyone off Companies that don't take themselves too seriously, win Learn from it, UNITED Doug's book is still truckin' along on Amazon Keep it up, boo! Closing Lines Patreon Special shout-out to Ryan Estis, Jane Atkinson and Michael Steinhardt! No time to get to this, but you can read the blog here: 12 worries that every entrepreneur has Proud to be affiliated with the C-Suite Radio Network   Doug and Strickland's Stuff: Amazon #1 Best selling book Nice Guys Finish First. Business Building Bootcamp (10 Module Course)   Need Podcast Production? www.podcastproduction4you.com   Partner Links: Amazon.com: Click before buying anything. Help support the podcast. Sign up for Sanebox free and get a $10.00 credit on us: The best way to get a handle on your E-Mail. Interview Valet:  Get interviewed on top podcasts and share your message. Acuity Scheduling: Stop wasting time going back and forth scheduling appointments   Survey: Take our short survey so The Nice Guys know what you like.   Nice Guys Links Subscribe to the Podcast Niceguysonbusiness.com You can text Doug anytime at 410-340-6861, of if you just want to leave us a message or record an intro to the show, call 4242 DJ DOUG (1-424-253-3684)   Promise Statement: To provide a learning experience that is entertaining and adds value to your life. Don't underestimate the Power of Nice.

Michael Steinhardt has known Doug for…a very long time. Hear his financial advice on The Nice Guys today.   Reach Us Here: Doug- @DJDoug Strickland- @NiceGuyonBiz On Facebook: The Nice Guys Community page   Become a patron and support the podcast at www.Patreon.com/NiceGuys   Show Notes by Production Assistant - Anna Nygren   Intro -- Age is just a number As we do get older, you ask yourself where you want to be and are you there     Uncovering the Questions -- Coaching is partly motivation and partly teaching Life is not a destination, it's a journey... corny but trueee Without planning, there's a lot of randomness that might work against you As consumers, we are swimming up stream in a lot of ways Financial Planning involves being creative and perhaps playing a game to keep it interesting      Closing Lines --   Trust your gut The sooner you start, the better   Check out Michael's website at www.clearpathadvisory.com Email Michael at Michael@clearpathadvisory.com Or Call him at (410) 486-5242 Proud to be affiliated with the C-Suite Radio Network     Doug's Stuff: Amazon #1 Best selling book Nice Guys Finish First. Business Building Bootcamp (10 Module Course)   Partner Links: Amazon.com: Click before buying anything. Help support the podcast. Sign up for Sanebox free and get a $10.00 credit on us: The best way to get a handle on your E-Mail. Interview Valet:  Get interviewed on top podcasts and share your message. Acuity Scheduling: Stop wasting time going back and forth scheduling appointments   Survey: Take our short survey so The Nice Guys know what you like.   Nice Guys Links Subscribe to the Podcast Niceguysonbusiness.com   You can text Doug anytime at 410-340-6861, of if you just want to leave us a message or record an intro to the show, call 4242 DJ DOUG (1-424-253-3684)   Promise Statement: To provide an experience that is entertaining and adds value to your life.   Don't underestimate the Power of Nice.  

In Part 2 of his conversation, Michael Steinhardt, named "Wall Street's Greatest Trader," brings us to the founding of the Birthright program, experienced by more than 500,000 young adults, since 1999, and other ventures in support of Jewish education.

Part 1/2 part conversation, Michael Steinhardt, named "..Wall Street's Greatest Trader.." (Forbes, 2/10/14), speaks candidly about his early life: his parents, especially his father, his secular and religious education, and his fervent love for Israel.

Today marks the kick-off edition of Mind Over Money, the only podcast that exposes the psychology of investing. I’m Kevin Cook, your field-guide and story-teller for the fascinating arena known as behavioral economics, which includes the sub-field behavioral finance and also draws in the related research from neuroscience, where brain imaging “sheds light,” if you’ll pardon the pun, on how we make decisions about money, uncertainty, and risk.   Jason Zweig described these merging fields in his 2007 book Your Money & Your Brain: How the New Science of Neuroeconomics Can Help Make You Rich.   Zweig, as you may know, wrote for Money magazine for years and was the editor of the revised edition of Benjamin Graham’s The Intelligent Investor. He now writes for the WSJ. So he wasn’t just a journalist describing an investing fad. He’s schooled in classical investing methods and knew he was on to something of enduring importance when he either coined, or at least put on the map, the term “neuroeconomics.”   He opens his book, which I consider must-reading for all students of the market, this way…   “How could I have been such an idiot?” If you’ve never yelled that sentence at yourself in a fury, you’re not an investor. There may be nothing across the entire spectrum of human endeavor that makes so many smart people feel so stupid as investing does.   But actually, I didn’t discover Jason’s book until about 5 years ago. And I had been working on the same ideas as him prior to the financial crisis. In fact, I published part of my thesis that “Your Brain Wasn’t Made to Trade” in 2008 in an industry magazine called SFO, which stood for Stocks, Futures, and Options.   My objective with Mind Over Money is to inspire you to be nearly as interested in behavioral economics, behavioral finance, and neuroscience as Mr. Zweig and I both are. And of course, we both give you plenty of other experts and resources to aid in that endeavor. That’s because so many great and dedicated researchers came before us and created the invaluable insights of these fields.   My unique contribution is that before I discovered behavioral finance or became passionately interested in brain science, I was studying great traders and terrible traders, through their successes and their failures, on the trading floors of Chicago since the mid-1990s.   This Is Your Brain on Risk   There are a lot of forces and players on Wall Street that can separate you from your money. But our greatest financial enemy is often ourselves.   Three great areas of study give us insight about this self-sabotage: behavioral finance, neuroscience, and the collective wisdom of great investors and traders who discovered through hard-won experience what those two sciences now teach us.   When we study these areas, we can become more aware and better equipped to spot how our own minds and habits either get in the way or help us make better decisions when it comes to money, uncertainty, and risk.   One group of researchers studies people from the outside-in, the behavioral finance group, who owe much to the ground-breaking work of Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky in the 1970s.   The other group, the neuroscientists, studies our behavior from the inside-out, as they pinpoint what brain structures and functions are involved in different types of decisions and responses.   What happens when our minds meet markets has been a passionate area of interest for me for over 20 years, ever since I first walked on the trading floors of Chicago and watched the good, the bad, and the ugly among professional speculators.   So how did I come to the conclusion that “your brain wasn’t made to trade?” It’s a bold statement. But once I show you the evidence behind it, I bet you will agree.   The Era of Rogues and Geniuses   In 1995, when my trading career was first getting started, the oldest bank in the world collapsed because of the rogue actions of one employee. Founded in 1762, Barings Bank was wiped out by trader Nick Leeson who was taking on exceptionally large trades – and losses – in Japan’s Nikkei futures market.   And he was able to hide them for a time until the risk managers finally woke up and started to notice that accounts were not balancing.   At the time, it seemed people everywhere – from journalists and regulators to traders, bankers, and the man or woman on the street – were all shocked that something like this could happen.   I started tracking stories like this, especially as they seemed to be occurring more often. In 1998, we saw the biggest hedge fund failure ever – up to that time. It is dwarfed by comparison since then.   Long-Term Capital Management had to be bailed out by 16 Wall Street investment banks, in a campaign orchestrated by the Greenspan-led Federal Reserve, because their losses in interest rate sensitive markets around the globe were viewed as threatening to financial markets.   The bailout at over $3.5 billion is considered paltry by today’s “too big to fail” standards. But the truly notable dynamic was that the fund was run by some of the smartest minds on Wall Street, like Myron Scholes who had just won a Nobel prize in Economics the year before.   I also kept track of the big blow-outs I witnessed in the trading pits in Chicago. New floor traders would always come and go on a regular basis. But the surprises came when a 20-year veteran would suddenly vanish because he took exceptional risk that went way wrong and wiped out a multi-million dollar account.   Rogues, Gamblers, and Wizards: What can we learn from them?   As I watched the rogues and the blowouts, I also read about the great traders. Jack Schwager’s books about the Market Wizards are really required reading for anyone who wants to become a full-time trader. They are in-depth interviews with big successes like George Soros, Paul Tudor Jones, Michael Steinhardt, and options wizards like Blair Hull.   As I read these dozens of interviews across 3 of Schwager’s books, I found six themes all these great traders and investors had in common. I’m going to list them for you because even before I had ever heard of behavioral finance or became interested in brain science, these “street-smart” winners had cornered the market on the principles of being in command of their own minds and trading behavior:   1.    Psychology: emotional decision-making was a paramount discovery 2.    Discipline: having lost big without them, rules became lifesavers 3.    Risk Management: the “golden rule” is to cut losses quickly and let winners run 4.    Probability: repeatable methods & mechanics of risk/reward evaluation 5.    Consistency: steady compounding was better than windfalls and wipeouts 6.    Systems: putting the first 5 together in routines of planning & preparation When I became a professional currency trader in 1999 upon the introduction of the euro, I noticed that even bank traders were an emotional and irrational bunch. As I studied the two sciences, I concluded that our brains were “hard-wired” to break the “golden rule” of trading.   In other words, our fear-driven, excitable, and emotional brains preferred (1) to avoid losses at all costs (so we would only take them when it was almost too late) and (2) to take gains quickly. This irrational and upside-down approach to risk/ and reward was the mathematical road to insolvency.   So I started researching how to train “trader brains” and I developed a probability simulation called Masters of PROP: Probability, Risk, and Optimal Profit. That trader training never goes out of date because its subject material, human brains, remain irrational, decade after decade.   Is It All Just About Greed?   So if the Market Wizards principles of the world’s best traders and investors worked so universally, what were the rogue traders and reckless fund managers doing – just the opposite?   Well, it’s a little more complicated than that. Because while there might be a half-dozen ways to do things right, there are many dozens, if not hundreds, of ways to make our money go away.   What always gets highlighted with rogues and “geniuses” that fail is that they were just greedy. But as I put together my thesis that “Your Brain Wasn’t Made to Trade” in the early 2000s, I came up with 3 more distinct and important drivers of financial bad behavior…   #1: Ego and the desire to be seen as “the great trader.” This was evident in so many of the rogue trader stories, like John Rusnak accumulating $700 million in losses for Allied Irish bank between 1997 and 2002.   #2: Irrational or immature beliefs about money, success, self-worth, and happiness such as “I deserve it!” or “This needs to happen now!” or “Once I win this back, I’ll make everything right again.” This kind of stuff tends toward either unconscious or full-blown narcissism with lots of emotional immaturity in between.   #3: Ignorance or lack of skill with probability   The primary reason I think we gain so much from studying rogues and other reckless gamblers is because what the rogue does to a billion dollars of other people’s money, we can do to our own accounts if we are not aware of our mental habits and cognitive biases as they impact our decision-making with money and risk.   And here, I have a confession to make.   While I could be as guilty as any investor-trader of any of these faults, the one I knew I had to immediately do something about was Probability. As a trading floor clerk in the late 1990s, I realized I had to make up for my lack of understanding and skill with probability.   And since equations were not my favorite things in high school or college, I found that the stories of how probability was invented and how it was used – in the options markets, in Vegas, in sports, and in weather modeling – pulled me in and gave me a practical way to learn the math I needed to know.   I must have read the stories of how Pascal and Fermat invented modern probability theory in the 1650s a dozen times before it started to sink in and I could make sense of all the equations that came after.   But you’re probably still wondering where I get the nerve to say Your Brain Wasn’t Made to Trade?   It’s all in this week’s podcast.   And be sure to check out my weekly video where I expose the psychology of investing with behavioral and cognitive biases. My most recent gives a great example of mental accounting.

My guest today is Tom DeMark, the founder and CEO of DeMark Analytics and the creator of the DeMark Indicators. The DeMARK studies are known internationally for their objective and mechanically-driven approach to both trading and investing, and are designed to anticipate potential price activity in the financial markets. The topic is Trend Following. In this episode of Trend Following Radio we discuss: How all conceivable market factors are in the price movement Obsession, passion and practice Having the “cover story” of fundamentals, but using technical analysis behind the scenes Elliott wave The fibonacci sequence Forecasting DeMark's thoughts on George Soros, Michael Steinhardt, Paul Jones, Steve Cohen, and others Thoughts on when DeMark first started computerizing his indicators Why you'll fail if you rely solely on charts DeMark's thoughts on the pure price driven, reactive trend following traders Introducing a new variable into a pure trend following approach Jump in! --- I'm MICHAEL COVEL, the host of TREND FOLLOWING RADIO, and I'm proud to have delivered 10+ million podcast listens since 2012. Investments, economics, psychology, politics, decision-making, human behavior, entrepreneurship and trend following are all passionately explored and debated on my show. To start? I'd like to give you a great piece of advice you can use in your life and trading journey… cut your losses! You will find much more about that philosophy here: https://www.trendfollowing.com/trend/ You can watch a free video here: https://www.trendfollowing.com/video/ Can't get enough of this episode? You can choose from my thousand plus episodes here: https://www.trendfollowing.com/podcast My social media platforms: Twitter: @covel Facebook: @trendfollowing LinkedIn: @covel Instagram: @mikecovel Hope you enjoy my never-ending podcast conversation!

Michael Covel speaks with Tom DeMark. DeMark is the founder and CEO of DeMark Analytics and the creator of the DeMark Indicators. DeMark considers himself a market timer and believes that fundamentals are critical; however, he and Covel have a lot in common. His work is price driven and technically driven. DeMark and Covel discuss how all conceivable market factors are in the price movement; obsession, passion and practice; having the “cover story” of fundamentals, but using technical analysis behind the scenes; Elliott wave; the fibonacci sequence; forecasting; DeMark’s thoughts on George Soros, Michael Steinhardt, Paul Jones, Steve Cohen, and others; thoughts on when DeMark first started computerizing his indicators; why you’ll fail if you rely solely on charts; DeMark’s thoughts on the pure price driven, reactive trend following traders; and introducing a new variable into a pure trend following approach. Receive a free trend following DVD? Go to trendfollowing.com/win.

Following a high-profile career in finance in which he became one of the first well-known hedge fund managers Michael Steinhardt began the Taglit-Birthright Israel program a philanthropic enterprise which has provided free 10-day trips to Israel for some 220 000 Jewish youth to learn more about their heritage. Steinhardt spoke with Knowledge at Wharton about how the program helps to improve the country's image and the challenges of what he calls a deteriorating educational system in Israel -- marked by a brain drain in higher education. Steinhardt also discussed the country's culture of business innovation and how deep democratic roots can sometimes slow progress. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.