Philanthropy: Giving, Status, and Influence
Big-donor philanthropy is less about giving than structuring. A foundation must pay out 5% a year; a donor-advised fund needs to pay out nothing. Here’s how the money, status, and influence actually move.
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Trusts: How Wealth Is Held, Protected, and Passed On
A trust isn’t one thing. The kind most people get skips probate but protects nothing; the kind that moves real wealth works only because you give up control. Here’s which does what.
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Private Banking: Services, Perks, and What It Really Means
Private banking isn’t fancy checking. At J.P. Morgan and Citi the real minimum is now around $10 million — and the perk that matters is cheap credit, not better deposit rates.
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Asian and Gulf Wealth: Hong Kong, Singapore, Dubai, and the Geography of New Money
How money is migrating to Asia and the Gulf — why Singapore, Dubai, and Hong Kong compete for the world’s fortunes, what each offers, and the catch nobody advertises.
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Falls From Grace: Bankruptcies, Frauds, and Reversed Fortunes
Falls from grace — how great fortunes collapse through bankruptcy, fraud, and reversed luck. Batista, Madoff, Holmes, FTX, Lehman, and the four trapdoors that recur every era.
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Hedge Funds and Private Equity: The Other Engine of Modern Finance Wealth
How hedge funds and private equity actually make money — 2-and-20, carried interest, and how partners turn a fund into a personal fortune. Plus whether the model still works.
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Generational Wealth: How Long Fortunes Actually Last
Does wealth really vanish in three generations? The real data on the 70/90 rule, the Vanderbilt collapse, and how the Rockefellers and Waltons engineered fortunes that lasted.
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Offshore: Tax Havens, Shell Companies, and the Panama Papers
What ‘offshore’ really means — tax havens, shell companies, trusts, and the Panama Papers. Why most of it is legal, what it costs governments, and why billionaires pay almost nothing.
