Opening Belle (14 page)

“Of course I will, but a little toy from the airport,” I reply softly, grateful to talk to him and not his father.

“Mommy can buy a BIG toy, she has so much money.”

Bruce must have read the business headlines.

“Nothing like teaching your kids all the wrong values,” I bellow, and Bruce takes the phone back.

“Okay, Belle, just how much of that CeeV-TV did you take down?”

Whenever Bruce uses Wall Street jargon in all the wrong ways, it warms my heart. It's cute like a child is cute. Moments like these he forgets that he hates Wall Street. “Well, Bruce, we ‘took down' enough to, hmmm, buy a tiny house in the Hamptons and dump that moldy rental.”

“No way.” He pauses long enough for me to imagine a certain genuflection to the gods. “No way. How much?”

“Umm, enough to pay off the mortgage on a certain Central Park West apartment,” I say with only a hint of a tremble.

“Belly Belle, my heart is pounding. My dick is stiff. How much?”

“Stop talking like that in front of Owen,” I plead, but little gets past a two-year-old.

I hear a chant begin in the background. “Stiff dick, stick shift dick. My shift is dick.” I giggle in spite of our awful parenting.

“I don't know. We own about one hundred ten thousand shares with a cost basis of nine dollars. Watch it trade today, we'll see how it opens, and where it settles, and then maybe I can figure out a number. Look, Bruce, the deal can always fall apart.”

“Holy mother of macaroni,” he says. “Ninety thousand dollars.”

I wince and try to love him despite a mathematical education that he should sue his preppy New England boarding school over. How did they ever graduate him with those skills?

“Umm, not really. Our cost basis was well over nine hundred thousand dollars. It looks like it will open around thirty dollars, so figure twenty-one dollars profit on one hundred ten thousand shares.”

“What is the NUMBER?” he hollers. He now has me on the speakerphone. I'm sure I've just heard something crash that contained glass, and I hear the scraping noise of him keeping small digits away from death-defying danger, and this of course makes me admire him. Shit, why had I done that kissing last night?

“It could fall apart, Bruce, but on paper, it's at least a two million and three hundred thousand dollar profit”—I pause—“before tax.”

“O-boe, we are RICH!!! Your mommy's a genius!”

“Yup, me rich! Yup, smart mommy!” and then I hear more glass break and I try to envision what they are doing and in which room they could possibly be finding so many things to destroy.

“It was really your idea,” I say, generously pumping up Bruce's manly hormones, “and we don't deserve to be rich.” I giggle. “We're Central Park West's version of trailer trash.”

“Who are you kidding?” he says modestly. “I say a lot about a lot. It's another thing to take action. When you get home we're serving you macaroni and cheese on the fine bone china.”

“We don't have bone china.”

“But we could.”

“You grew up with that. You hated it. You hated doilies too.”

“I forgot.”

“We'll order sushi,” I suggest.

“Yeah, and eat with our hands. That's the sort of rich we are.”

“Yeah, let's go crazy and maybe even eat in a restaurant,” I say while thanking a higher power for reminding me that my husband is funny, and for this unexpected diversion from my sinful ways. I hang up.

M
Y JOB
at this conference, besides swooning in a wet bathrobe and apparently bunking with clients, is to moderate one of the panels. This means I came up with the topic and secured the guest speakers whom I will interview, Katie Couric–style, in front of the attendees. King is now moderating the one before mine and he's chosen a topic getting traction in the press lately, “Do Hedge Fund Managers Deserve Their Current Level of Compensation?”

While we are paid handsomely, the hedge funders make us look like people on a breadline and many of those hedge fund guys are here. King is digging deep and lobbing milquetoasty questions to the panel to justify their nutty compensation. He does this for two reasons: First, Feagin Dixon gets to appear to federal regulators like we too have a scrutinizing eye on overpayment in the industry. We all do everything in our power to not be investigated and this panel topic makes us look critical of the money machine. The second reason is to appease these hedge funders themselves, whose wealth trickles to us in the form of deal and trading fees. If they stop making crazy money, then so will we. In the end, King will summarize for the audience why these guys are worth every penny and they can feel good about themselves and about us.

From my seat I watch a mathematical geek sitting in the front row, James Simon. He's a guy who bases his trades on numerical fluctuations in his portfolio and hedges his bets. Last year he took home $1.7 billion, a number that seems inconceivable, even in Monopoly money terms. Did James Simon really
earn
$1.7 billion? Did he actually
make
something to do that? Since the union pension funds he manages are probably getting a better return on their money than if it were, say, in the bank, does that justify overpaying a few people? I know a free economy will support whatever the market will bear, but since all these funds have the same rates and conditions, aren't they acting like a monopoly? Do the institutions that have to trust them have any ability to pay lower fees if they all charge the same or are they essentially forced to pay these fees? Has Bruce become like a voice inside my head with this stuff? My own panel is about to start so I stop ruminating and get my head in the game.

All anyone really wants to discuss here is the volatile mortgage-backed securities market, but my topic is something far fresher, something I think is the next place to make some home-run investments in and I'm determined to grab the attention of the room. I've entitled it “What's a Fair Price to Pay for a Library of Freely Submitted Content?” In this world where everyone shares their videos, movies, songs, blogs, and ideas, how do we value the company that everyone posts them to? That's my big idea, something I came up with when I was trying to value CeeV-TV.

My three panelists and I sit onstage, behind a table with polyester drapes Velcroed into place. I sweep my eyes across the room and can tell that Henry isn't here, because even in a sea of white men wearing polos and khakis, Henry stands out. I thought he'd come, especially since he has a truckload of CeeV-TV, and I check my gut and push away the thought that maybe Henry still can't stand to see me succeed.

Last night proved we could be great business associates focused on our mutual success and we're into a new chapter in our relationship that does not include kissing.

The news about CeeV-TV will make my panel discussion the most timely one of the day. Many of the hedge fund investors here either own property like CeeV-TV, or are short (meaning they bet the price will fall) the public stocks of similar companies. But when I look at the audience, I see a sea of distraction. The questions I have readied for the panelists seem vanilla and the audience catatonic. While my first guest drones about his investing methodology, my mind drifts to tomorrow, when I have that Glass Ceiling Club lunch to discuss Naked Girl and when I return to my family. Will it be hard to face Bruce? Should I tell Bruce? Would I tell him just to feel less guilty or to make sure I never do it again?

“CeeV-TV is an excellent example,” this panelist is saying, “of low barriers of entry into this business. It should be worth nothing because competitors will pop up everywhere.”

This speaker is a stocky man, a manager from the pension funds of the State of California. State employees receive about one grain of the bushel of compensation the others in this room get. They tend to not like anything and I wonder if some are mad at themselves for not starting their career on the private rather than public side. My attention deficit subsides as the conversation ratchets up. Then I do what I do best—lob a question that is insightful, provocative, and intelligent.

“So, Liam, do you agree?”

I have no idea what Mr. California has just said. The one thing I do know is that by simply asking someone to agree, the discussion will keep moving while I fumble to get my brain in gear.

“I think this CeeV-TV should be worth about one dollar per share,” says the Californian guy. He doesn't like all these new, growth-fueled companies. “This thing is a flash in the pan. If content is free and barriers to entry to stream that content are low, I'm not buying the stock. That's a loser's game.”

Many state funds are managed more cautiously, preferring value rather than explosive growth. They tend to be more careful with the money entrusted to them so they want to feel something tangible, to touch the bricks and mortar under their feet before they'll invest in a company. They don't buy dreams. People who believe the positive stuff about the CeeV-TV story like growth. They'll pay big multiples for ideas and intangibles about companies with no profit. My third panelist is one of these growth investors and he finally wakes up.

“I disagree,” he says while clearing his throat. He's a smartly dressed British guy, about my age though some balding makes me unsure. “If you sell content that is provided free, how can you be anything
but
profitable?”

“Because, young man,” growls California State Fund Guy, “every Tom, Dick, and Harry can do the same thing, which makes your company worthless.”

But I know they can't. I'm tempted to interrupt, to tell him why, but the Brit is fired up.

“You cannot implore your target market to think you are cool: you either are or you are not. It's called branding. You can't just go get an image or change your image overnight. CeeV-TV has established itself as cool. Like with people, it's hard to become cool when you've been quite uncool your whole life. CeeV-TV is the coolest thing out there.”

British Guy seems to be talking about more than stocks here. I think he's just insulted the nerdy, older pension manager and to me,
that
was very uncool. I need to calm things down but he continues to speak. “In fact, I think the multiple that CeeV-TV is worth is about double where this deal talk is. Google is lowballing these guys. Google is getting a bargain and I'm a buyer of both stocks.”

I hear the room wake up. This is where I'm supposed to say something, to inflame the conversation and get us to new territory. I lob another killer question.

“Why?” I ask, even though I can answer this question better than anyone in the room.

“Why?” snooty British Guy asks me sarcastically.

He's irritating as hell now. By picking the one stock I know more about than him, he has met his match. I ready my tirade of facts about CeeV-TV, about to bring the house down. I try to let him finish so we aren't speaking over each other. In other words, I am polite, which in business can also be interpreted as being weak.

“Right. Well, for one, Google is getting a deal. And if Google is getting it at a fire sale price, the public stock of Google will trade even higher. This also means that if Google is getting a deal, others will come to play. This means a bidding war for CeeV-TV.”

I listen, thinking this means more money for the McElroys, as the stock is sure to go higher. I envision the CeeV-TV spreadsheet in my mind. I'm about to spew the facts I know so well about this company, but then get interrupted.

The voice comes from the audience and it's not even question time. It's a commanding voice, a voice of authority from a person also able to spew the facts, facts that I've given him.

“Liam, we see other content providers paying triple the CeeV-TV bid multiple. Why did Google go in with such a low offer?” It's Henry.

Liam answers with weak details that support Henry but nobody's even listening. They hear the words
low offer
, they think it's cheap, and they want to be buyers. Henry is leading the investors in this room to bid up his position in CeeV-TV and will move the public stock of Google higher too. Henry already owns both.

Some people leave the room to call their trading desks, some start sending trading orders on their BlackBerry. I now also know the reason Henry was so late to the conference discussion this morning: he was setting up his sell orders. Most likely he'll be selling to the very people who just left the room to go buy his stock, locking in his giant gains in both CeeV-TV and Google. Henry's position will be down to zero by the end of the day. He is ahead of everyone. Henry looks brilliant, and even though it was my idea, everyone will remember it as Henry's. My panel is breaking up, and I never got my moment to shine. I waited too long, and Henry, once again, has won.

I
BUMP ALONG
in a pimped-out van going to King's winter vacation house. Each of these conferences is strategically located near one of our executives' second or third home in Anguilla, Provence, Jackson Hole, or any place where they line the driveways with money. One evening's entertainment will be watching an aging rock star perform for rich people in some depressing way—that was last night thanks to Hootie and the Blowfish, which my dinner with Gibbs had me miss—while the second evening includes dinner at the high-ranking investment fund/host's house. That is tonight. King's third home is located on South Ocean Boulevard in Palm Beach, where he will keep us all outside looking in on a breathtakingly beautiful February evening.

Gone are the days when I avoided being the first guest at a party. I'm so rushed to get everything done that self-consciousness isn't a luxury I have. I need to cross commitments off my list at a mind-spinning rate of efficiency, so here I sit in an empty van, the first van to leave the hotel, in an effort to get to the party, speak to whom I need to speak to, and leave.