King of Capital

“The authors … [take] us from the early days of the Blackstone Group, when the firm was just two guys and a secretary, to the buyout boom, when Mr. Schwarzman’s conspicuous consumption became a symbol of the new Gilded Age. In between, the book dives deeply into the firm’s signature deals — Celanese! Nalco! Distressed cable bonds! — that made Mr. Schwarzman and his partners so rich. It also delivers some fun details about many of the now-famous Wall Street players that did tours of duty at the firm. —New York Times DealBook “Carey and Morris’ thorough reporting offers a compelling look into the little understood Wall Street giant and the secrets of its success.” —Worth Magazine “[R]anks as one of the most even-handed treatments of the industry. David Carey and John Morris … received unusual access to Blackstone… . This allowed them to chronicle the firm in full and entertaining fashion across its 25-year history.” —Bloomberg Brief – Mergers “[A] broad history of private equity, with Blackstone as the touchstone.” —Fortune.com   “Check out “King of Capital” because it’s got gossip, it’s got brains, and it’s as readable as hell. And it’s got some really good Schwarzman stories too.” —The Deal “King of Capital aspires to be a serious portrait of Blackstone and the way that Schwarzman so brilliantly built it up, scoring numerous coups along the way and avoiding the mistakes of many competitors. And it does a fine job in what it sets out to do.” —Financial Times“The authors link Blackstone’s history to the larger story of private equity’s expansion and its relationship to corporate America. They offer a lucid explanation of how the debt markets evolved from junk bonds to securitised loans, changing the types of deals that private-equity firms were able to finance.”—The Economist

DAVID CAREY is a reporter at Bloomberg. Before joining Bloomberg, he was a senior writer for The Deal, an editor of Corporate Finance magazine, and wrote for Adweek, Fortune, Institutional Investor, and Financial World.

JOHN E. MORRIS has been a Bloomberg Brief editor, an editor with Dow Jones Investment Banker, and was for many years an assistant managing editor at The Deal in New York and London. Before that, he was an editor and writer at The American Lawyer magazine.