Loose Ends: Powerball!

“There are three ways to make a living in this business,” says Jeremy Irons, playing a Wall Street C.E.O. in “Margin Call.” “Be first, be smarter, or cheat.”

Now there is a fourth: Powerball.

Last week, the chance of winning the biggest lottery in Connecticut’s history was one in 195,249,054 — about the odds of Herman Cain’s winning the Republican nomination for president. But when three executives at Belpointe Asset Management in Greenwich, Conn., bought a $1 ticket in the Powerball lottery, it became, overnight, $254.2 million.

The winners elected to take a lump sum, giving them $151.7 million and a tax bill of about $48 million. That’s $34.6 million per winner. And yet Timothy C. Davidson, Brandon E. Lacoff and Gregory H. Skidmore didn’t look happy about their astronomical rate of return when, as mandated by Connecticut law, they appeared at a news conference holding a giant check made out to Jackpot Winner.

Why so glum? It’s not hard to identify reasons for their distress.

First, personal embarrassment. They knew that media reports would lead with lines like this one from The New York Times, “The lottery is full of rags-to-riches tales. Now the 1 percent has its own feel-good story.” And the thing of it is, in Greenwich they’re not 1 percenters. In a haven where many have had Powerball wealth and then some for decades, there are, a longtime resident told me, three kinds of money. “There’s ‘world money,’ which lives in houses that start at $20 million. There’s ‘Wall Street money,’ which means, ‘I’ve got $10 million.’ And there’s ‘I’ve done well money,’ which lives in houses that cost less than $7 million. That’s these guys.”

Worse, these oh-so-few millions have created unwanted transparency. The trio has given no interviews, but they don’t have to; a few minutes with Google and Google Earth will tell the curious, the envious and the resentful more than Greenwich’s wealthiest would like them to know. And not just about these men.

A few years ago, Belpointe developed Beacon Hill, “the first guard gated town community in downtown Greenwich.” These 16 stone-and-shingle homes, set on 1.75 acres, are massive by non-Greenwich standards. In their 4,400 square feet, you’ll find as many as five bedrooms, 10-foot-high ceilings, white oak floors, wine cellars and “tasting” rooms, plus the obligatory exercise room. A calculator on the Web page saves you the trouble of wondering if you can afford to live here. Put down 20 percent of the $2,595,000 purchase price, take a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage at 5 percent, and your bank will want $11,344 a month from you.

These are not numbers that will endear Greenwich to many in the 99 percent. And remember, this is Greenwich at the low end. Let your fingers do some walking down Round Hill Road, and you’ll find yourself taking a virtual tour of a “livable scale” home with a 70-foot marble reflecting pool and fountain in the courtyard, an 86-foot great hall and a 52-foot indoor pool. Price: $42,900,000. And, surely, there are better.

Pity the Powerball winners. There are, as they know well, many asset managers who have “one large” — a billion dollars — to invest. Belpointe has $82 million. Collectively, the winners are worth more than their employer. And yet, in Greenwich, they’re schmoes.

But would the barbarians at the virtual gates listen to the facts? Sadly, no. Occupy Greenwich could so easily follow.

Jesse Kornbluth is the editor of HeadButler.com.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=e0cd0dd8fe1e1d18e27a2b3e6af51a85