Trump, Howard Lutnick & Cantor Fitzgerald

(From Forbes) ‘The Most Hated Guy On Wall Street’

Having rebuilt his firm after losing hundreds of employees, and his brother, on 9/11, Howard Lutnick should be one of the most respected CEOs in America. Why do so many people despise him?

On September 11, 2001, he was dropping off his oldest son on his first day of kindergarten, when a plane struck the World Trade Center, where Cantor Fitzgerald’s headquarters sat on the 101st to 105th floors. All 658 of his employees in the building that morning were killed, including Lutnick’s brother Gary, his best friend Doug, 28 sets of brothers and one set of sisters. Describing the close-knit workplace, Lutnick recalled his hiring strategy: “We had an unusual model. We only wanted to work with people that we liked.” Out of tragedy came purpose. Lutnick promised to give 25% of the firm’s profits to families of the deceased for five years, eventually shelling out $180 million.
 

Twenty-three years later, Lutnick still sees himself as a model of patriotism and determination. Many others do, too. When Trump announced Lutnick’s nomination as commerce secretary on Truth Social on Tuesday, he did not focus on his business acumen or trade-policy knowledge. Instead, Trump mostly recounted the 9/11 events and described Lutnick as an “inspiration to the world” and “the embodiment of resilience in the face of unspeakable tragedy.”
It’s a true, and undoubtedly inspirational, story. But Lutnick has a darker side, which emerges in court documents and conversations with people who have done business with him. For years, they say, he and his firm have been pulling money from people—clients, investors, colleagues—making Lutnick, according to one former partner, “the most hated guy on Wall Street.” His multibillion-dollar empire–which includes two publicly traded companies and a privately held investment bank—is a tangle of self-dealing, with recordkeeping issues that date back decades and infighting that continues to the present day. “The whole firm is about f——— people,” says another former employee. “It’s about squeezing people.”