Edward Lampert Quotes

I have very good friends on Wall Street.

Sometimes acting and politics make a very bad combination. I think that sometimes people take me less seriously in my work for the UN because I am an actor.

It is, of course, the first recourse of every elitist to see social barbarism in others.

Private equity has been the purview of super wealthy individuals and institutions.

Many hedge fund managers have become billionaires; perhaps this - plus their reputations as the smartest guys in the room - is why they have captured the investing public's imagination.

I have been in Wall Street all of my life. I love it. It has been good to me. I know many wonderful, decent, honorable, ethical, hard-working people that were in Wall Street with me.

Respect can be as elusive as the unicorn. I know something of this because I write books that are set in the Middle Ages, and the historical novel is often seen as the unwanted stepchild in the fictional family. I know even more about respect - or the lack thereof - because I live in New Jersey.

It's a very enclosed world on Wall Street.

When you hear of somebody named Goldberg, you think of a guy sitting behind a desk investing your money.

I think very few people still understand the distinction between CEOs on Wall Street and the hedge-fund billionaires operating separately.

My older son works in finance and private equity, which he loves, and Lucas works in film and theater.

Whenever I go to a new team the jabs about being a Harvard guy are always more prevalent. This is mainly because people don't know much about me other than being the Harvard guy that did well on his Wonderlic test. The more time I spend with people, the less the Harvard stuff comes up.

Fruitcakes have a bad rap.

I've had tweets questioning whether I really did go to university because surely I would have lost my accent if I did; a letter suggesting, very politely, that I get correction therapy; and an email saying I should get back to my council estate and leave the serious work to the clever folk.

Let's say for instance people say, "He's a really totalitarian, strict guy, he's hard to work with or whatever." I don't think it's true, but people's perception of me leads that direction, like I'm a fundamentalist person. I end up having to spend extra time saying, "I'm not a fundamentalist." I have other stuff to do.

In my first book, 'Ghosts Of Manhattan,' the setting was Wall Street, and I explored the predictable nature of a bond trader inside the compensation scheme at Bear Stearns and the government regulations of Wall Street. That was about money.

I have had to answer questions like, 'But you don't look like lead material.' Now, I still don't know what 'lead material' looks like because everyone has eyes, a nose, and a face.

Some people assume I'm a spoilt trust fund kid who's never had to work for anything, while others think the best of me because of the good experience they had with my grandfather. It's difficult to digest the fact that they may never see me for who I am.

It's just sad that one's attitude is always speculated, even if you've not done something.

I wouldn't in any way say I distanced myself from Wall Street.

Historically venture capital funds have only allowed elite investors in.

I studied economics and thought I wanted to play with the stock market - my dad was a financial adviser - and I was going to go down that path. I was an intern at Smith Barney.

I remember once at the end of a BBC job interview the manager said to me: 'I didn't realise people like you were clever.' I don't think he was being intentionally nasty. At that time in the BBC he was surrounded by clones of himself, give or take some facial hair and glasses.

When you look a certain way, or you have a certain presence, people take someone else's word over yours.

Whatever I do, if people see me in a certain light, then they will always judge me in that light. Their impressions and perceptions will never change.