EX-BANKER TRIES HIS LUCK WITH SEX TOYS
OF ALL the career paths followed by former City types who have lost jobs in the recession, this one really does take the biscuit. Matt Thomas, a former manager in corporate finance at Seymour Pierce, decided to make the most of the opportunity when he was made redundant last November by setting up a joint venture with a chum who he’d previously worked with at KPMG – in the raunchy business of sex toys.
The enterprising pair are targeting the more discerning customer with their new website, www.LaCoquette.com, which sells upmarket toys from the sublime to the, well, plain ridiculous. Two of their bestsellers for Christmas are a device that plugs into your iPod and converts soundwaves to vibrations, and an “intelligent” gadget that, ahem, remembers your movements for a more personalised experience next time around. Oo-er.
“I did a lot of head-scratching about where the opportunities might be in the downturn,” Thomas tells me. “It sounds like a cliché, but sex has always sold – and we thought there was a gap in the market for really good quality products.”
And along with the freedom of having his own business, Thomas is also, naturally, enjoying all the attention that his new job brings.
“It is a brave new world,” he laughs. “At dinner parties and weddings I used to tell people I was an investment banker and that would be that. Now, they’re hanging onto my every word!” Quite the epitome of the old adage of “every cloud has a silver lining”, I’m sure.
JUDGEMENT DAY
Now that the banking world have gone all holier-than-thou on us – with Goldman Sachs top dog Lloyd Blankfein claiming bankers “do God’s work”, Barclays chief John Varley telling an audience at St Martin-in-the-Fields church that bonuses are “not satanic”, and so on – The Capitalist thought it wise to get advice from someone in the know.
Mark Speeks, who some readers will know as the managing partner of private equity firm Acuity Capital, is also an assistant priest at St Botolph’s Church in Aldgate, having been ordained while studying theology at Yale back in 2002.
So what does he reckon to bankers getting on their biblical soapboxes?
“It isn’t particularly appropriate to be using that kind of religious terminology at the moment, but that’s more from a PR perspective than anything else,” Speeks tells me. “But the whole question surrounding bonuses is very complex – you need to look through the veil of what banks do with their money, how they deploy their capital, and it isn’t necessarily easy to do. Goldman does do a lot of charity work and their employees pay a large amount of tax around the world – and besides, the concept of risk-taking is addressed in the scriptures with the parable of the talents.”
That, to recap, is the tale of a master who left home to travel and gave his three servants different amounts of money. The first and second were given five and two “talents” (monetary units) respectively and doubled their money, for which they were lauded as being good and faithful. But the third, who buried his one talent in the ground for safekeeping, was dubbed wicked and lazy for not having generated any return.
Perhaps RBS chief Stephen Hester would like to adopt that one as his own?
HOME SWEET HOME
Hedge fund gurus looking for some after-work entertainment this week could do worse than to pop along to their local Mews Gallery – next door to swanky eatery Mews of Mayfair, for those whose senses are more attuned to carnal pleasures than all things arty.
Actress Joanna Lumley’s son, budding photographer Jamie, is exhibiting a selection of photographs entitled “Prayer Flags and Goal Posts”, documenting contrasting images of “home” in London and Nepal, where his grandfather served with the Gurkhas during World War II. Like mother, like son…
PARTY TIME
Those in business have always known how to work and play hard, so it comes as no surprise that one of their number is taking that idea to a new record-breaking level. David Johnstone, the founder of VIP privilege club Key-2 Luxury, and his business partner, hedge fund veteran Stanley Fink, are planning the party to end all parties – no less than 80 glitzy bashes across the world in just 24 hours.
“This is going to be the 21st century equivalent of Phileas Fogg’s epic journey in Jules Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days,” says Johnstone, who’s planning the party for 17 September 2011.
“There is a credit crunch – fact – but there has to be a future, and I’m saying let’s start thinking about it now.”
The firm is signing up some of the ritziest venues in the world to host the celebrations, and while partners in London haven’t yet been decided, Key-2 already works with the likes of the Dorchester, Kensington Roof Gardens and Boujis, so watch this space.
ALL THAT GLITTERS
Much has been made recently about Ounces to Pounds, the gold party organisers which throws bashes where people bring their hoards of gold to exchange for ready cash in the recession. But now, The Capitalist hears some have even been approaching the firm to ask if they can have their gold teeth pulled out to get their hands on the money.
A slightly stomach-churning step too far, perhaps?