Marc Rich | |
---|---|
Born |
Marcell David Reich December 18, 1934 Antwerp, Belgium |
Died | June 26, 2013 Lucerne, Switzerland |
(aged 78)
Cause of death | Stroke |
Citizenship | Belgium, Bolivia, United States, Israel, Spain |
Occupation | Founder of Glencore |
Known for | Banking, trading activities |
Net worth | $1 billion (2010) |
Spouse(s) |
|
Website | Official website |
Marc Rich (born Marcell David Reich; December 18, 1934 – June 26, 2013) was an international commodities trader, hedge fund manager, financier and businessman. He was best known for founding the commodities company Glencore and for being indicted in the United States on federal charges of tax evasion and making controversial oil deals with Iran during the Iran hostage crisis. He was in Switzerland at the time of the indictment and never returned to the United States. He received a controversial presidential pardon from U.S. President Bill Clinton on January 20, 2001, Clinton's last day in office.
Rich was born in 1934 to a Jewish family in Antwerp, Belgium. His parents were working-class Jews who emigrated with their son to the United States in 1941 to escape the Nazis. His father opened a jewelry store in Kansas City, Missouri. The family moved to Queens, New York City in 1950, where Rich's father started a company that imported Bengali jute to make burlap bags. Rich's father later started a business trading agricultural products and helped found the American Bolivian Bank.
Rich attended high school at the Rhodes Preparatory School in Manhattan. He later attended New York University, but dropped out after one semester to go work for Philipp Brothers (now known as Phibro LLC) in 1954. He worked as a commodities trader for his father, who sought to build an American manufacturing fortune through burlap-sack production.
Rich married Denise Eisenberg, a songwriter and heir to a New England shoe manufacturing fortune, in 1966. They had three children, one of whom, Gabrielle Rich Aouad, died at age 27 of leukemia in 1996. The couple divorced in 1996; she continued to use the name Denise Rich. Six months later he married Gisela Rossi, although that marriage also ended in divorce, in 2005.