Ex-hedge fund star Richard Perry stages epic comeback at 70
Ex-Wall Street hotshot Richard Perry is reportedly plotting a comeback — nearly a decade after shuttering his hedge fund after losing a fortune trying to save the Barneys department store.
The sharp-dressed 70-year-old — a Goldman Sachs alum who famously favored pricey Thom Browne suits with skinny ties and shrunken-looking trousers — will team up with his former right-hand man, Todd Westhus, according to Bloomberg.
Perry — who also had grabbed headlines over an ostentatious Jeff Koons sculpture he placed on the balcony of his Midtown Manhattan apartment, irking neighbors — has joined Westhus’s Olympus Peak Management firm as a partner, the outlet reported, citing sources familiar with the matter.
Todd Westhus’s Olympus Peak has made eye-popping profits on the bankruptcies of Latin American carrier Latam Airlines and crypto exchange FTX. The report added that the two financiers will launch a new $500 million distressed credit fund with Matt Englehardt, another one of their former associates.
The Wall Street return bid comes after Perry was forced to shutter his eponymously titled Perry Capital in 2016. The firm lost more than 60% of its assets under management over its final two years in business as mounting losses eroded investor trust.
“I have this hope that someone says, ‘I love what you guys did, your team did things that were completely different, and how can I participate with them in the future?’” Perry said in an interview at the time.
Aside from amassing an ill-fated, 75% stake in Barney’s, Perry invested heavily in Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae in 2010 but sued the government for “illegally seizing the profits” for the US Treasury.
He launched the fund back in 1988 after cutting his teeth at Goldman Sachs on the bank’s merger arbitrage desk. At its peak, Perry Capital once controlled $15 billion in assets and regularly posted a 10.7% annualized return.
It famously made a $2 billion windfall betting on the 2008 subprime mortgage crisis and $600 million on Argentine bonds.
Perry and his fashion designer wife Lisa helped raise money for Kamala Harris’s botched 2024 presidential run.
Lisa often posted pictures of the glamorous couple on their travels across the US and Europe on her Instagram account.
Lisa also had a clothing line at Barney’s 22 stores nationwide before the retailer went bankrupt on Aug. 6, 2019.
She had shuttered lthe abel’s flagship store on 988 Madison Ave. after four years in 2016 — shortly after her husband’s hedge fund closed.
Perry and his wife angered neighbors when they installed a glitzy Jeff Koons sculpture of a giant, green diamond on their penthouse terrace at 1 Sutton Place South.
Residents living across the street at 14 Sutton Place South griped to The Post about the Perrys’ installation for its allegedly blinding reflections of light throughout the day.
The pair have in recent years developed and sold an array of luxury properties.
They still have homes in New York and Palm Beach, as well as properties in Villefranche-sur-Mer on the French Cote d’Azur and The Hamptons.
