The New Crowd: The Changing of the Jewish Guard on Wall Street

Finance journalists Ehrlich and Rehfeld here vividly chronicle the swift rise to enormous wealth of a new breed of Wall Street achievers since the 1960s--when ``for the first time it was all right to be under forty, brash and Jewish.'' This group not only brushed aside the old conservative Jewish ``Our Crowd'' but much of the WASP establishment as well, the authors show, as now famous names like Felix Rohatyn, Sanford Weill and John Gutfreud (as well as the infamous Ivan Boesky) create a financial world of mergers, leveraged buyouts, risk arbitrage and junk-bond borrowing with huge profits for the clever and courageous. The authors recount personal histories, explain the technicalities of major deals and offer plenty of gossip as the principal players and their wives, a ``nouvelle society,'' compete in the lavishness of their entertaining. For its comprehensiveness, style and originality, the book deserves a wide readership. Photos not seen by PW. (Oct.)