Former Fed Chair Ben Bernanke is wasting no time assuring his financial future after being on the global economic hot seat for eight years. Forbes reports that Bernanke has been active on the mega-rich speaking circuit since he left his post in January, including a recent dinner at Le Bernardin in New York hosted by a major Wall Street trading firm and a speech given to 1,000 attendees at the Emirates Palace in Abu Dhabi.
Many sources in both the public and private sector give Bernanke and his highly accommodative “easy money” policies a significant amount of credit for preventing the 2008 financial crisis from turning into a global economic depression.
Recent speaking engagements
Bernanke was the speaker at a dinner hosted by BTIG Wednesday night at Le Bernardin, where enjoyed the company of some of Wall Street’s biggest names including the chief executives of Moore Capital Management and Glenview Capital Management, as well as Fortress Investment Group LLC (NYSE:FIG)’ Mike Novogratz, Greenlight Capital’s David Einhorn and a number of other Wall Street luminaries.
He also reportedly received $250,000 for his 40-minute speech to a large group of businessmen and government officials in Abu Dhabi a couple of weeks ago. According to the New York Post, the former Fed Chairman has also agreed to a $300,000 speaking gig in Turkey later this year. Bernanke was paid a salary of $199,000 during his final year as Fed Chair.
Bernanke writing a memoir
The Forbes article also mentions that Bernanke is planning to write a memoir of his tumultuous eight years as Fed Chair. Analysts say penning an account of both the heady days before the financial crisis and the decisions made during the dark days of the crisis could lead to an eight-figure windfall for Big Ben. Former Fed Chair Alan Greenspan got an $8 million cash advance from Penguin Press for his book and Bernanke should easily be able to top that. Not surprisingly, Bernanke is also represented by Robert Barnett, the attorney who represented Greenspan in his book negotiations.
