Edgar
Perez, author of Knightmare on Wall Street and The Speed Traders,
calls on the mainstream media to stop referring Donald Trump as a
billionaire until he releases his tax returns and agrees to an
independent audit.
New
York City, NY, USA -- Part of the allure of Donald Trump, the
Republican nominee in the upcoming U.S. elections, comes from his
being wealthy, very wealthy. Books tell us about his incredible
endurance and resilience after business bankruptcies brought his net
worth down to minus $900 million, as he admitted to former wife Marla
Maples when they were strolling along New York's Fifth Avenue in the
early 90s. Furthermore, the media doesn't get tired of calling Donald
J. Trump a billionaire, again and again.
A
simple Google search for Donald Trump and the word billionaire brings
up 38 million results; the same search with the word millionaire
instead brings up just a bit more than 1 million results. The media
could be forgiven of pushing this billionaire narrative if we
consider that three prestigious publications have canonized Donald
Trump as billionaire: Bloomberg, Fortune and Forbes.
How
do they know Trump is a billionaire? Forbes gave once an overview of
its methodology, "We keep track of their moves: the deals they
negotiate, the land they're selling, the paintings they're buying,
the causes they give to. Securities & Exchange Commission
documents, court records, probate records, tax records, federal
financial disclosures and Web and print stories-we dig through them
all. In calculating wealth, we put a price on all assets, including
stakes in public and privately held companies, real estate, art,
yachts and planes." Did I read tax records? In Trump's case,
this small detail might have been missing for decades, as he has
proclaimed his taxes are none of the American public's business.
Trump
himself has discounted Forbes's calculations for a different reason.
"I think that they are very good people. I like the people at
Forbes. They don't know a lot of the things I own. I don't think they
give me any value for brand and my brand is very valuable. I do deals
- I'm doing deals right now. In fact, when I leave you, I'm signing a
branding deal that's a phenomenal, tremendous hundreds of millions of
dollars in value, all because of my brand," said Trump to CNBC's
John Harwood.
What
type of assumptions is Forbes doing to estimate Trump's wealth when
they don't have access to his tax returns? Are they only relying on
statements prepared by Trump himself or his advisors? What about if
the estimates are way too high? In 1976, The New York Times published
a fawning profile of Trump in which he was quoted as saying he was
worth $200 million; that figure was utterly false, according to
examination of Trump's finances in 1981 by the Casino Control
Commission.
Journalist
Timothy O'Brien is among the few who saw Trump's tax returns yet he
is legally prevented from talking about them in detail; he has
implied that Trump's income is much lower than he often suggests; as
expected from Trump, O'Brien was sued for libel after he claimed in a
2005 book that Trump's real net worth was as low as $150 million-$250
million. For a man that has attempted to persuade America of his $10
billion net worth, the lower range falls into the plausible.
It
is time to stop this part of the Trump's mythology once and for all.
What about if the media stops calling Trump a billionaire until he
releases his tax returns and proves he deserves that label? What
about if Trumps agrees to an audit from an independent body that can
obtain access to all relevant information? The onus is on Trump.
Edgar
Perez (http://www.MrEdgarPerez.com),
author of The Speed Traders and Knightmare on Wall Street, is a
recognized keynote speaker and director of programs targeted at board
members, chief executive officers and senior executives looking for
new ways to gain and maintain a competitive business advantage. He
can be reached through Twitter and Weibo.
ABOUT
KNIGHTMARE ON WALL STREET
Knightmare
on Wall Street, The Rise and Fall of Knight Capital and the Biggest
Risk for Financial Markets, provides a fascinating account of what it
took to elevate the firm to the cusp of the retail investing
revolution of the late 1990s, to struggle through booms and busts,
and to bring the firm down, to end up ultimately being ignominiously
bought up by a competitor.
Knight
Capital announced a staggering loss of $440 million. What followed
after this shocking announcement were several rounds of desperate
conversations with a number of vulture players who had smelled
opportunity and were readying themselves to pick up bargain-priced
pieces. On August 6, 2012, Joyce confirmed that Knight Capital had
struck a deal with Jefferies, TD Ameritrade, Blackstone, GETCO,
Stephens, and Stifel Financial, staving off collapse days after the
trading mishap.
Knightmare
on Wall Street, is a thrilling minute-by-minute account of the
terrifying hours following Knight Capital's August 1, 2012 trading
debacle, with news-breaking research regarding the firm's 17 years of
tumultuous existence as an independent company. Knightmare on Wall
Street is the definitive behind-the-scenes story of Knight Capital.
ABOUT
THE SPEED TRADERS
High-frequency
traders have been called many things-from masters of the universe and
market pioneers to exploiters, computer geeks, and even predators.
Everyone in the business of investing has an opinion of speed
traders, but how many really understand how they operate? The shadow
people of the investing world, today's high-frequency traders have
decidedly kept a low profile-until now. In this new title, The Speed
Traders, Mr. Perez opens the door to the secretive world of
high-frequency trading (HFT). Inside, prominent figures of HFT drop
their guard and speak with unprecedented candidness about their
trade.
Mr.
Perez begins with an overview of computerized trading, which formally
began on February 8, 1971, when NASDAQ launched the world's first
electronic market with 2,500 over-the-counter stocks and which has
evolved into the present-day practice of making multiple trades in a
matter of microseconds. He then picks the brains of today's top
players. John Netto (M3 Capital), Manoj Narang (Tradeworx), and Aaron
Lebovitz (Infinium Capital Management) are just a few of the
luminaries who decided to break their silence and speak openly to Mr.
Perez. Virtually all of the expertise available from the world of
speed trading is packed into these pages.
The
Speed Traders, published by McGraw-Hill, is the most comprehensive,
revealing work available on the most important development in trading
in generations. High-frequency trading will no doubt play an ever
larger role as computer technology advances and the global exchanges
embrace fast electronic access. The Speed Traders explains everything
there is to know about how today's high-frequency traders make
millions-one cent at a time.
ABOUT
EDGAR PEREZ
Mr.
Edgar Perez is an educator, published author, business consultant for
billion-dollar private equity and hedge funds and Council Member at
the Gerson Lehrman Group, Guidepoint Global Advisors, Research
International and Internal Consulting Group, with subject matter
expertise in cyber security, investing, trading, financial regulation
(Dodd-Frank Act) and market structure.
He
is author of Knightmare on Wall Street, The Rise and Fall of Knight
Capital and the Biggest Risk for Financial Markets (2013), and The
Speed Traders, An Insider's Look at the New High-Frequency Trading
Phenomenon That is Transforming the Investing World, published in
English by McGraw-Hill Inc. (2011), Published in Mandarin by China
Financial Publishing House (2012), and Investasi Super Kilat,
published in Bahasa Indonesia by Kompas Gramedia (2012).
Mr.
Perez is course director of Cybersecurity Boardroom Workshop, How
Boards of Directors and CXOs Can Build the Proper Foundation to
Address Today's Information Security Challenges, and The Speed
Traders Workshop, How High Frequency Traders Leverage Profitable
Strategies to Find Alpha in Equities, Options, Futures and FX; he has
presented his workshops in Singapore, Hong Kong, Sao Paulo, Seoul,
Kuala Lumpur, Warsaw, Kiev, New York, Singapore, Beijing, Shanghai.
He contributes to The New York Times and China's International
Finance News and Sina Finance.
Mr.
Perez has presented to the Council on Foreign Relations, Vadym Hetman
Kyiv National Economic University (Kiev), Quant Investment & HFT
Summit APAC (Shanghai), U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission
(Washington DC), CFA Singapore, Hong Kong Securities Institute,
Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences at New York University,
University of International Business and Economics (Beijing), Hult
International Business School (Shanghai) and Pace University (New
York), among other public and private institutions. In addition, Mr.
Perez has spoken at a number of global conferences, including Cyber
Security World Conference (New York), Inside Market Data (Chicago),
Emerging Markets Investments Summit (Warsaw), CME Group's Global
Financial Leadership Conference (Naples Beach, FL), Harvard Business
School's Venture Capital & Private Equity Conference (Boston),
High-Frequency Trading Leaders Forum (New York, Chicago), MIT Sloan
Investment Management Conference (Cambridge), Institutional
Investor's Global Growth Markets Forum (London), Technical Analysis
Society (Singapore), TradeTech Asia (Singapore), FIXGlobal Face2Face
(Seoul) and Private Equity Convention Russia, CIS & Eurasia
(London).
Mr.
Perez has been interviewed on CNN's Quest Means Business, CNBC's
Squawk on the Street, Worldwide Exchange, Cash Flow and Squawk Box,
FOX BUSINESS's Countdown to the Closing Bell and After the Bell,
Bloomberg TV's Market Makers, CNN en Español's Dinero, Petersburg -
Channel 5, Sina Finance, BNN's Business Day, CCTV China, Bankier.pl,
TheStreet.com, Leaderonomics, GPW Media, Channel NewsAsia's Business
Tonight and Cents & Sensibilities. In addition, Mr. Perez has
been featured on Sohu, News.Sina.com, Yicai, eastmoney, Caijing,
ETF88.com, 360doc, AH Radio, CNFOL.com, CITICS Futures, Tongxin
Securities, ZhiCheng.com, CBNweek.com, Caixin, Futures Daily, Xinhua,
CBN Newswire, Chinese Financial News, ifeng.com, International
Finance News, Finance.QQ.com, hexun.com, Finance.Sina.com, The Korea
Times, The Korea Herald, The Star, The Malaysian Insider, BMF 89.9,
iMoney Hong Kong, CNBC, Bloomberg Hedge Fund Brief, The Wall Street
Journal, The New York Times, Dallas Morning News, Valor Econômico,
FIXGlobal Trading, TODAY Online, Oriental Daily News and Business
Times.
Mr.
Perez was a vice president at Citigroup, a senior consultant at IBM,
and a strategy consultant at McKinsey & Co. in New York City.
Previously, he managed Operations and Technology for Peruval Finance.
Mr. Perez has an undergraduate degree in Systems Engineering from
Universidad Nacional de Ingeniería, Lima, Peru (1994), a Master of
Administration from Universidad ESAN, Lima, Peru (1997) and a Master
of Business Administration from Columbia Business School, New York,
with a dual major in Finance and Management (2002). He belongs to the
Beta Gamma Sigma honor society. Mr. Perez is an accomplished salsa
and hustle dancer and resides in the New York City area with wife
Olga, son Edgar Felipe and daughter Svetlana Sofia.
Media
Contact:
Julia
Petrova
Media
Relations Coordinator
The
Speed Traders
+1-414-FORUMS0
