Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news. Well, our next guest
Speaker 1: needs really no introduction. He's familiar to the Bloomberg audience.
Speaker 1: Leon Cooperman spent twenty five years at Goldman Sachs. He
Speaker 1: was a partner and chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs
Speaker 1: Asset Management. He then went on to create the hedge
Speaker 1: Fund Omega Advisors in the Omega Family Office, where he
Speaker 1: now oversees more than ten billion dollars in assets.
Speaker 2: He's also known for his philanthropy, signing on to the
Speaker 2: Giving Pledge more than a decade ago and having donated
Speaker 2: many millions to various causes, including Columbia Business School, Saint
Speaker 2: Barnabas Medical Center, and most recently fifty million dollars to
Speaker 2: the New Jersey Performing Art Center. Something we want to
Speaker 2: talk with him about, and yes, a lot more with
Speaker 2: us is Leon Cooperman. He is charing CEO of the
Speaker 2: Omega Family Office. He joins us along with John Schreiber,
Speaker 2: President CEO of the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, both
Speaker 2: joining us from Newark and gentlemen, great to have you
Speaker 2: here with us.
Speaker 3: Thank you, nice to be with you. Let me correct
Speaker 3: once that you should I managed ten billion when I
Speaker 3: was in business. I retired in twenty eighteen. Unfortunately we
Speaker 3: have less than ten billion. We have with my own
Speaker 3: money and my son and my wife less than ten
Speaker 3: billion by the lot.
Speaker 2: We appreciate that because we like to get it right here.
Speaker 2: So thank you, thank you for that, and thank you
Speaker 2: again both of you for joining us. We want to
Speaker 2: talk about this gift, but got to say leon Lee,
Speaker 2: that we would certainly get a lot of flack from
Speaker 2: our Blueberg users if we didn't ask you about the
Speaker 2: market environment as well. So we just want to take
Speaker 2: a few moments just to ask you about that. You know,
Speaker 2: we have seen records on Wall Street again this week
Speaker 2: there are concerns about overvaluation. I'm just curious, do you
Speaker 2: feel comfortable with where the market is and do you
Speaker 2: expect it to continue to move up higher, especially when
Speaker 2: it comes to us docs.
Speaker 3: I'm not comfortable. I think I'm less optimissing the consensus.
Speaker 3: I'm bothered by the excessive valuation road history with a
Speaker 3: ninety percentel evaluation, and certainly relative to the obvious macro
Speaker 3: wishes which the market for some reason is ignoring. I'm
Speaker 3: bothered by the excessive reliance on debt. We have the
Speaker 3: guns and economic policy which will ultimately to crowding out.
Speaker 3: And all these data centers are being announced since noone
Speaker 3: has to finance them. Two menu, it's demand for credit.
Speaker 3: And think it's surprised of me when they cut short
Speaker 3: rates long rates to they move up stock market very
Speaker 3: expensive at the long rates. And can we become a
Speaker 3: problem for stock market?
Speaker 1: When does it become a problem?
Speaker 3: Yeah, you don't know. You know, I were for lower levels,
Speaker 3: but I've been too conservative. But I've not been sure anything.
Speaker 3: I'm showing stuff becoming more liquid, but I would say
Speaker 3: that you know, ben markers don't materialize. They have a
Speaker 3: macroconception that tends to be a causative factor that the
Speaker 3: city has to blow up in. Uh the uh you
Speaker 3: know these well, these announcements of these deals with the
Speaker 3: centers data centers, we have to be the voluntory session
Speaker 3: race after works for port when they start the market. Clearly,
Speaker 3: I love Warren Buffett's coming, which I can allot if
Speaker 3: I can find it. Uh, I was none of the
Speaker 3: impression this was my hit, not but the market. But
Speaker 3: you know, Warren Buffett quite some time ago observed that
Speaker 3: where book market gets going. People basically ignore the interest
Speaker 3: rates and profits and they figured out that they're making
Speaker 3: money and they can't fail to be out of stock market. Yeah.
Speaker 3: We yeah. This was a speech he gave in nineteen
Speaker 3: ninety nine. Once a bookmark gets under way, and once
Speaker 3: she reached the point where everybody had made mind no
Speaker 3: matter what system he or she has followed attracted to.
Speaker 3: Their game is respying that the interest rates and profits
Speaker 3: pacimplar to the fact it seems to be a mistaked
Speaker 3: to be out of stocks. In fact, these people superpose
Speaker 3: on on and I can't miss the party factor on
Speaker 3: top of the fundamental issue that drive the market. Like
Speaker 3: Pavelov Dog, these investors and quotes learned that when the
Speaker 3: bill rings, in this case the one that opens the
Speaker 3: newk Stock exchange in nine thirty am. At nine thirty am,
Speaker 3: they get fed. This is daily reinforcement. They become convinced
Speaker 3: that there's a guard that he wants them to get rich.
Speaker 3: That's a great description what's going on now. People that
Speaker 3: were negative of a stock market return positive, and the
Speaker 3: markets in ninety percent of evaluation versus history. We have
Speaker 3: a very unusual president is doing unusual things. Now he's
Speaker 3: trying his best, but it hairy a difficult hand. And
Speaker 3: I think this stuff with tariffs is a mistake, but
Speaker 3: you know, from uncomfortable.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's interesting. You talked about data centers too and
Speaker 2: the AI spend. I mean, we did have Jeff Bezos
Speaker 2: of of course Amazon saying that the spending on artificial
Speaker 2: intelligence resembles an industrial bubble that could lead to lost
Speaker 2: investment but will also make society better off. Can I
Speaker 2: just ask you real quickly AI? Is your family office
Speaker 2: using it?
Speaker 3: Yet? We won't? People ask? Oh, then I was going
Speaker 3: too early.
Speaker 2: I totally get it. We're talking with Leon Cooperman Lee Cooperman,
Speaker 2: chair and CEO of a mega family office, with us
Speaker 2: from New Jersey, John Schreiber, also with US president and
Speaker 2: CEO of the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, and we
Speaker 2: do want to get to this gift that you have
Speaker 2: made lead to the New Jersey pack. We often talk
Speaker 2: with you about markets, but we also do take note
Speaker 2: of your philanthropy. Why this investment fifty million donation to
Speaker 2: the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, the largest individual gift
Speaker 2: in the art Center's history. Why did you do that?
Speaker 3: Well? I need to see yes, No, the background so
Speaker 3: simply stated, my wife and I have lived the American dream,
Speaker 3: and financial resources were largely being directed to help the
Speaker 3: n see kids achieve who we have been with virtue
Speaker 3: of their hard work, luck and a few two decisions
Speaker 3: during my earlier in my career. So in my case,
Speaker 3: my father came to America in nineteen twenty four, Warsap poet.
Speaker 3: He came at the age of twelve, so he was
Speaker 3: born in nineteen oh eight, and he had no full education.
Speaker 3: And I went to public school in the Bronx High
Speaker 3: School in the Bronx College in the West Bronx. I
Speaker 3: with my grade school and my public school with the
Speaker 3: East Bronx. I followed advice the Hordes scriber, I went west.
Speaker 3: I moved to the West Bronx and then I had
Speaker 3: a short sight Columbia Business School, which over the door
Speaker 3: to Coldman Sachs in my career at Wall Street. So yeah,
Speaker 3: we want to give kids today the chance to achieve
Speaker 3: the same thing that my wife and I achieved. Simple
Speaker 3: as that. And I figured only fourth things you can
Speaker 3: do with money, you know, And I'm more different than
Speaker 3: your boss, Michae Bloomberg said, I have a few less zeros.
Speaker 2: These extremely fun.
Speaker 3: For twenty five years. Yeah, we turned able to vote.
Speaker 3: It's forty years ago, and when he ran for president,
Speaker 3: I switched to a Democratic Party so I can vote,
Speaker 3: work for him and support him. Unfortunately, he kind of
Speaker 3: fland that very quickly. But I said, only four things
Speaker 3: you can do with money. First thing you can do
Speaker 3: money is you can pleasure yourself and buy planes, by automobile,
Speaker 3: by baseball teams. There's nothing wrong with that. My wife
Speaker 3: and I have simple tastes. We both have assumed a
Speaker 3: view that this is more so give.
Speaker 2: And you know, one of the things we want to
Speaker 2: do Lee is actually talk to John Schreiber about what
Speaker 2: this money means to him.
Speaker 1: Yeah, John Schrieber, come on in here, presidency of the
Speaker 1: New Jersey Performing Arts Center, talk about how transformative this
Speaker 1: gift is. What exactly you can do with the fifty
Speaker 1: million dollars.
Speaker 4: It's a remarkable gift, and we know, of course, couldn't
Speaker 4: be more grateful to Lee and Toby for making it.
Speaker 4: It's an endowment gift. We spend a NJ peck about
Speaker 4: eight million dollars a year on what we call social
Speaker 4: impact work. That's work in arts, education, community engagement, the
Speaker 4: intersection of arts and health. Almost everything we do for community,
Speaker 4: and we are living in an under resource community of
Speaker 4: Newark and Greater Newark is free to community. So we
Speaker 4: reach one hundred thousand kids and families every year and
Speaker 4: we are opening in about two years what is called
Speaker 4: the Coopman Center. Lee made an earlier gift of twenty
Speaker 4: million dollars that was a starter gift for an education
Speaker 4: and community center sixty thousand square feet on our campus
Speaker 4: that will be open six days a week. Every activity
Speaker 4: we do there, from mothers and babies to older adults,
Speaker 4: will be free to community, and we want to endow
Speaker 4: that work. No matter what is happening in the economy
Speaker 4: or more broadly, from the government, we can predictably deliver
Speaker 4: these important kind of life changing services to community, and
Speaker 4: Lee and Toby made that possible with this gift.
Speaker 1: John, we're Bloomberg. We talk about data. We like to
Speaker 1: measure things. I want to know from you. How you
Speaker 1: measure the impact of a gift such as this. What
Speaker 1: are the metrics you use to make sure that it
Speaker 1: is effective, to make sure that you're using the money
Speaker 1: in the most effective way possible.
Speaker 4: Well, it's interesting, it's a combination of real data and
Speaker 4: what we hear and learn from community. So we did
Speaker 4: financial modeling that showed us what not only Lee's gift,
Speaker 4: but I hope to raise another fifty million dollars in
Speaker 4: the next couple of years so that this work is
Speaker 4: endowed with one hundred million dollars and that will enable us,
Speaker 4: based on our research, to deliver services every year in
Speaker 4: a predictable fashion. And then what we see with our
Speaker 4: kids and what we see with our families. You know,
Speaker 4: sometimes this work can change a life. I know, it
Speaker 4: always enhances the lives of the people that we're engaged with.
Speaker 2: You know, Lee, I think about I'm going to bring
Speaker 2: you back in here. I think about this political environment
Speaker 2: that we are in, and you know, with the government shutdown,
Speaker 2: money not going to different states for different projects. We
Speaker 2: know the importance of both public private sector and making
Speaker 2: cities more secure and creating economic activity and kind of
Speaker 2: spreading the wealth, if you will, among citizens. And I
Speaker 2: wonder if there's a kind of a big broad observation
Speaker 2: for you, especially like as we talked about a little
Speaker 2: bit earlier, this kind of politically divided environment, any economic
Speaker 2: and market consequences of such well, I.
Speaker 3: Think the needs are even greater. The government has reduced
Speaker 3: funding dramatically and the needs are growing. I caught on
Speaker 3: TV the other day the mayor of Los Angeles. It's
Speaker 3: something like this, fifty thousand homeless people in LA and
Speaker 3: looking to wealthy people to help cover the cost. And
Speaker 3: I said to myself, my God, stay of California as
Speaker 3: the highest state income tax in the country, and I
Speaker 3: can't afford to pay the bills. So I think the
Speaker 3: private sector has to step up, and the government has
Speaker 3: to kind of reduce their cost of living. Not an
Speaker 3: easy thing to do. We've had inappropriate policies on both sides.
Speaker 3: I think, well, Trump is a take it to many
Speaker 3: people and he understands the need to do something, and
Speaker 3: I just need you'm doing it the wrong way.
Speaker 2: John, I want to bring you back in here. As
Speaker 2: president and CEO of the New Jersey Performing Arts Center.
Speaker 2: You talked about the impact of this money. But you
Speaker 2: know I have done things that NJIT. We've done live
Speaker 2: broadcasts from there. We have seen Audible and Amazon and
Speaker 2: some of the different companies that have invested in that area.
Speaker 2: And we've seen kind of the starts and stops of
Speaker 2: certainly Newark as a whole, a city that has certainly
Speaker 2: got quite a storied history. Right, tell us what you
Speaker 2: can about the economy of Newark right now. And again,
Speaker 2: you know, I think when we look at cities, we
Speaker 2: get a better picture of America as a whole.
Speaker 4: Well, Newark is certainly an under resource. It's one of
Speaker 4: the poorest cities in the country. That said, Newark is
Speaker 4: on the rise. We have a really effective mayor. He's
Speaker 4: a practical progressive. I'm sure you've talked to him. His
Speaker 4: name is Rosmaraka. And right now, thanks to this mayor
Speaker 4: and to Governor Murphy and to philanthropists like Lead, this
Speaker 4: art center is in the middle of a three hundred
Speaker 4: and fifty million dollars a real estate development project that
Speaker 4: includes two hundred and forty five units of residential the
Speaker 4: education Center, town homes, new streetscape, and this is all
Speaker 4: on the Njpack campus, right. And what we've observed in
Speaker 4: Newark is that if you build it, they will come.
Speaker 4: So as a as a community on the rise, as
Speaker 4: a residential community with a bright future, Newark has got
Speaker 4: that crime is down. We're dealing with homelessness and food
Speaker 4: insecurity in very intentional ways, and it's a very collaborative community.
Speaker 4: So as an anchor cultural institution, which NJPECK defines itself as,
Speaker 4: we feel like we're in really good company with Prudential,
Speaker 4: with horizonbal Cross, Blue Shield, with Audible, with Panasonic, with
Speaker 4: lots of corporate anchors who are including Barnaba's Health, who
Speaker 4: are invested in the economic future of the city, but
Speaker 4: also the bright lives of the folks who live here.
Speaker 1: Well, I want to end with you and send one
Speaker 1: last question your way about the way you're thinking about
Speaker 1: your own future impact. As I mentioned, you've spent a
Speaker 1: lot supporting causes including Columbia Business School, Saint Barnabas Health,
Speaker 1: other health care facilities as well of course the performing arts,
Speaker 1: not just with this most recent gift, but with other
Speaker 1: gifts as well. Where else are you thinking of supporting?
Speaker 3: Well, I have a long list of things I support.
Speaker 3: One of the things that I like the most other
Speaker 3: than New Jersey and form Blast Center, is I create
Speaker 3: something called Coopman College scholars And so basically, if you
Speaker 3: live in a county, New Jersey and you take a
Speaker 3: three week free course at offered to explain what expect me.
Speaker 3: You're in college and you're academically qualified. I'm big on
Speaker 3: giving people equal opportunity for and that equal outcomes. That
Speaker 3: will give you a four year college education for free.
Speaker 3: And so you know now you asked for measurements, So
Speaker 3: I did. I gave that program twenty five million dollars
Speaker 3: seven years ago. And I told them I knew the statistics.
Speaker 3: Thirty five percent of new caucul case thirty five percent
Speaker 3: new causitl case went to college, only five percent graduated.
Speaker 3: I told her, I worked to office money for five
Speaker 3: percent graduation rate. You have show me a change. Well,
Speaker 3: our first court graduated a year ago. We had thirty
Speaker 3: five percent graduation rate, which is compared to the nationwide.
Speaker 3: I gave another twenty five million this morning. I asked
Speaker 3: them what I have to do to endow the program
Speaker 3: to you know, in perpetuity. You know, So I'm thinking
Speaker 3: now at my age of doing bequests organizations support for Columbia.
Speaker 3: I spoiled Hunter College. I suppoiled New Jersey before we
Speaker 3: got I support barnabus. Now where their initiation. A guy
Speaker 3: I have the enormous regard for is kenln going. It's
Speaker 3: when I gave the barnabus. He astually they can change
Speaker 3: the name of the hospital to come in barbas See.
Speaker 3: Why do you want to do that? He said, Well,
Speaker 3: Canland going to the lot for y U? And I
Speaker 3: don't have his money do? I have an enormous respect
Speaker 3: for Kenny's a very special guy. So you know, uh,
Speaker 3: there's a good courses is a shurage of money.
Speaker 2: Well, we certainly appreciate getting some time with both of you,
Speaker 2: and the best to both of you. Lee Cooperman, thank you,
Speaker 2: Chaar and CEO of the Omega Family Office, and of
Speaker 2: course John Schreiver Presidency of the New Jersey Performing Arts Center,
Speaker 2: both joining us from New Jersey.