64 New Yorkers Make ‘Forbes’ 400You haven’t, by any chance, been feeling rich lately, have you? Sort of feeling a little bit smug that the burst of the real-estate bubble won’t splatter all over you? At least a little bit excited that in November, your every-other-Friday paycheck will come three times instead of twice? Well, just in time for all that, Forbes has released its annual list of the 400 richest people in America. And guess what? Sixty-four of them are New Yorkers! The top 100 billionaires, in fact, include household (okay, apartment-hold) names like shareholder activist Carl Icahn, Revlon CEO Ron Perelman, designer Ralph Lauren, Condé Nast chairman Si Newhouse oh yeah, and Mayor Bloomberg, who at $11.5 billion is America’s 25th richest man. According to Forbes, he more than doubled his wealth from last year, which was enough to leapfrog over rival media magnate Rupert Murdoch in the ranks.
company town
Fashion Week to Continue to Trample Bryant ParkFINANCE
• Will the city council outlaw the ‘R’ word next? As Merrill Lynch’s chief economist puts it, calling the recent downturn a recession “is like looking a client in the eye and telling them that their child is ugly.” [FT via MSN]
• Second Life’s going through something of a recession too, but the Post thinks the cyber version of Fed chief Ben Bernanke is taking a more proactive role. Snap! [NYP]
• The hardest hit hedge funds in August include lots of big names, like Paul Tudor Jones, Louis Bacon, and Bruce Kovner. [FT via MSN]
gossipmonger
If Wolcott Did It…The owner of former meatpacking S&M club–cum–celeb hangout the Vault is shopping a dishy tell-all. James Wolcott got his hands on the O.J. Simpson book, wrote about it in Vanity Fair. Naomi Campbell is leaving her agency to join IMG. (She was also named ambassador to Rio by the Brazilian city’s mayor.) Being Anna Wintour’s assistant really is as difficult as Emily Blunt made it seem in The Devil Wears Prada.
