High life
The other side of the coin
Taki In my high gambling circles, one man stands out as being 'the luckiest punter of them all', Henryk de Kwiatkowski. In the 15 years that I've known him, I've seen him win millions of pounds on the blackjack tables at Aspinall's and have read about his incredible wins on the turf. One of the first horses he bought, although knowing next to nothing about racing, was Conquistador Cielo, nearly winning the American triple crown with it. He owns Calumet Farm, the leading Kentucky stud, which he picked up for a song and which now is worth its weight in gold.
Polish born and 72 years old, Henryk is a self-made man who made his fortune buy- ing up old aeroplanes and selling them to Third World countries. His American wife Barbara was among the legendary beauties of the Seventies and a regular member of Andy Warhol's factory. She is a close friend of mine. I attended their wedding party in Greenwich, Connecticut, where Henryk has a spread not unlike that of Jay Gatsby's across Long Island sound.
Henryk is a hell-for-leather type of chap, a man who learned to play polo in his six- ties and gave it the old college try until he badly broke his leg and was told in no uncertain terms 'to retire. He and I have had our share of arguments because both of us have rather strong opinions, but deep down inside I like him, and even admire his recklessness.
A couple of weeks ago Henryk hit the headlines overseas when he accused Bear Stearns and one of its managing directors of triggering $300,000,000-worth of losses in his brokerage account through unautho- rised foreign-currency trading. He has filed a suit. Then a London gossip column repeated the charges over the £200,000,000 loss.
Needless to say, I was intrigued. Ever since 1989 and my father's death, I've been an investor, and a passive one at that i.e., others, far smalter than yours truly, make the decisions to buy or sell. But I'm on top of it. The idea that as shrewd an investor as Henryk would allow a broker- age house to lose him 300 million big ones sounded preposterous. Added to that was the fact that I had done business with Bear Stearns and had found them impeccable in their dealings. Their version was different, to say the least.
First and foremost they claim that Hen- ryk is actually up more than 10 million greenbacks in all his trading in the period 1988-96. They also insist that he was advised daily on the status of his accounts and the conditions of the market; that he also directly participated in the decisions to liquidate his positions. Last, but hardly least important, Bear Stearns says that, contrary to the allegations made by Henryk to Nigel Dempster, there is no allegation of any unauthorised foreign-currency trading in the complaint filed in court.
Now I'm hardly in the position to judge the latter, but one thing is for sure: Henryk de Kwiatkowski is a very sophisticated investor who was married to a strategy bet- ting on the US dollar versus the British pound, the Swiss franc and Japanese yen. I only say that because he, told me that him- self. Fortunately, I did not follow his train of thought, not that he encouraged me to.
What I suspect is that he got carried away, as so many of us do. When the case comes to court we shall find out the truth. What is certain is that Henryk is still very well off. He has his private jet, his horses and his houses and studs. Mind you, had I lost the amount he claims to have lost, an amount I wish I had, I, too, might cry foul, but I somehow don't think so. I would have quit long before. I feel bad for Henryk but knowing him he'll make it back in no time. For fairness sake, I've just presented the other side of the argument. Time will tell, as they say in Wall Street. In the meantime, I'm staying away from currencies.
Taki's final sentence last week was cut off by mistake (not his). It should have read: As someone far wiser than the poor little Greek boy once said, 'The greatest threat of our time is neither Aids nor nuclear war, but the encroaching proletarian brutalism that is all encompassing.' Apologies.
Jeffrey Bernard is in hospital.
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