La finance expliquée - Joseph P. Kennedy : l’escroc, le père de JFK, et le régulateur
▻http://alternatives-economiques.fr/blogs/fabienhassan/2013/09/25/joseph-p-kennedy-l%E2%80%99escroc-le-pere-de-jfk-et-le-regu
On m’a raconté que la fortune du clan des Kenndys était amassé par des opérations de contrebande d’alcool pendant les années 1920 de la prohibition états-unienne. Je suis resté dubitatif . L’histoire est trop belle et simple pour être entièrement vraie.
Alors j’ai cherché un peu. Voilà quelques résultats.
Un épisode moins connu de l’histoire de Joseph Kennedy se situe entre juillet 1934 et septembre 1935. Le Président Roosevelt le fait alors élire à la tête de la toute nouvelle Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), l’agence fédérale américaine chargée de réguler les marchés financiers, qui existe encore aujourd’hui. Kennedy, qui espérait un ministère, accepte, mais annonce qu’il démissionnera une fois les bases de l’institution posées.
Le choix de Kennedy déclenche un scandale qui donne à Roosevelt l’occasion de répondre par l’une de ses plus célèbres répliques. Quand on lui demande pourquoi nommer un tel escroc, Roosevelt répond : « Takes one to catch one » (il en faut un pour en attraper un).
The bootleg politician : He could have anything he wanted, except the thing he wanted most. So Joe Kennedy used his money and the vast influence it bought to promote the next generation. But how had he made the fortune that bought the presidency ?
▻http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/the-bootleg-politician-he-could-have-anything-he-wanted-except-the-th
In the Twenties, rumour had it that Kennedy was a bootlegger, importing and selling illicit liquor. Doris Kearns, the only historian to have access to Kennedy’s papers, found scant evidence there to support the claims made by, among others, the gangsters Frank Costello and Meyer Lansky of large underworld deals. But Kennedy went into the Prohibition era with large stocks of liquor from his father’s stores, and on the day it ended he had three lucrative franchises for British whisky and gin, a company to important them, and a network of retailers already in place. It was the work of a man who knew well where the subterranean rivers of illicit booze had run during Prohibition, but kept the knowledge close. His papers guard it still.
Après avoir trouvé cette information l’opinion suivante me semble peu crédible. Elle correspond bizarrement bien á ce que raconte Wikipedia (en).
Was Joseph P. Kennedy a bootlegger ?
▻http://www.quora.com/Was-Joseph-P-Kennedy-a-bootlegger
Think “The Wolf of Wall Street” rather than “The Godfather”.
Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr.
▻http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_P._Kennedy,_Sr.
A recurring story about Kennedy is that he made money in bootlegging, the illegal importation and distribution of alcohol during Prohibition. Although there is no hard evidence of this, Kennedy did have extensive investments in the legal importation of spirits. The “bootlegging” story itself may be traceable to Canadian distiller Samuel Bronfman and to New England bootlegger Danny Walsh and his crime syndicate, which did in fact smuggle spirits across the Canadian–American border during this period. Post-Prohibition, Bronfman had a bitter rivalry with Kennedy in acquiring North American liquor distribution rights.[29]
At the start of the Franklin Roosevelt administration, Kennedy and Congressman James Roosevelt II founded Somerset Importers, an entity that acted as the exclusive American agent for Haig & Haig Scotch, Gordon’s Dry Gin and Dewar’s Scotch. It is rumored that they had assembled a large inventory of stock, which they supposedly sold for a profit of millions of dollars when Prohibition was repealed. Actually, it was not until long after Prohibition ended that Kennedy sold his company Somerset.
La source suivante est mons crédible qu’un journal professionnel, mais elle ajoute quelques éléments plausibles à l’histoire du bootlegging .
How the Kennedy Empire was Built
▻http://www.cwporter.com/ytedkempire.htm
On January 29, 1919, the Eighteenth Amendment was ratified. It prohibited the manufacture, sale, transportation, or importation of “intoxicating liquors” for “beverage purposes.” For Joe, the law represented an opportunity to make huge profits.
– He formed alliances with crime bosses in major markets, among them Boston, New York, Chicago, and New Orleans. These would come in handy years later when his son was running for national office. Among his mob associates was Frank Costello, former boss of the Luciano crime family, who bragged, “I helped Joe Kennedy get rich.” Sam Giancana, who would later figure prominently in Jack’s presidency, called Joe “one of the biggest crooks who ever lived.”
– Joe bought liquor from overseas distillers and supplied it to organized crime syndicates that picked up the liquor on the shore. Frank Costello would later confirm that Joe had approached him for help in smuggling liquor. Joe would have the liquor dumped at a so-called Rum Row - a transshipment point where police were paid to look the other way - and Costello and other mobsters would then take over. They distributed the liquor, fixed the prices, established quotas, and paid off law enforcement and politicians. They enforced their own law with machine guns, usually calling on experts who did bloody hits on contract.
–Columnist John Miller wrote, “The way Costello talked about Joe, you had the sense that they were very close during Prohibition.”
– By the mid-1920s, Fortune estimated Joe’s wealth at $2 million. Yet since Joe had left Hayden, Stone in 1922, he had had no visible job. While he made hundreds of thousands of dollars manipulating the market, only bootlegging on a sizable scale would account for such sudden and fabulous wealth.
– Joe used the profits from his bootlegging operations to fuel his continued stock market speculating, and finance his efforts in the film industry.
Le site sur Jacky Kennedy confirme une chose : la fortune de Joe Kennedy connaissait une croissance énorme pendant la prohibition, mais il n’y a pas de sources fiables pour confirmer son engagement dans des affaires précises. On sait aussi qu’il n’a pas occupé une position ou mené des affaires justifiant un tel succès financier pendant cette période. L’impression qu’il y a eu quelque chose se concrétise.
Joe’s Smuggling Past - Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis
▻http://www.netplaces.com/jacqueline-kennedy-onassis/the-kennedys/joes-smuggling-past.htm
Frank Costello On January 29, 1919, Congress approved the Eighteenth Amendment, and the era of Prohibition began. For Joe Kennedy, it was an opportunity to make a financial windfall. There was no shortage of private citizens and speakeasies willing to pay top dollar for smuggled liquor. To facilitate his new business, Joe formed alliances with mob figures in Boston, Chicago, New York, and New Orleans. Among his associates were Frank Costello, former head of the Luciano crime family, and Diamond Joe Esposito, an extortionist and bootlegger who belonged to Chicago’s notorious Black Hand. Joe would buy liquor — mostly scotch — from foreign distillers, who would deliver it at specific safe spots — areas where local police and politicians had been paid to look the other way. From there, organized crime would pick up the shipments and distribute it to their clients.
Onward and Upward
Smuggling was extremely profitable, and by the mid-1920s Joe’s personal fortune was in excess of $2 million — the equivalent of more than $15 million in today’s money.
Finalement Time nous apprend comment Joe Kennedy a corrompu Winston Churchill dans le but d’obtenir des contrats lucratifs. C’était bien avant qu’il devienne ambassadeur des USA en Grand Bretagne.
The Secret Boozy Deals of a Kennedy, a Churchill, and a Roosevelt
▻http://time.com/3529756/kennedy-churchill-roosevelt-investment-deal
Another set of finances surrounding this trip involved Winston Churchill. In September 1933, as the Kennedy group prepared to leave for London, Winston began a series of stock investments in two seemingly obscure American firms tied directly to Joe Kennedy: Brooklyn Manhattan Transit and National Distillers Products Corp. These Churchill stock investments were clustered around the Kennedy trip—executed both shortly before the Chartwell visit and in the months afterward—and were known only to a few, perhaps not even to Randolph. Where Winston got the money for such investments is not clear from available documents. On their face, however, these transactions seemed remarkably risky for a man who had lost much of his fortune in bad investments, who feared he might lose his beloved home, debt-ridden Chartwell Manor, and who had previously relied on friends to bail him out financially.
Winston’s involvement with the American liquor industry emerged shortly after Kennedy began selling British whiskey, archival records show. In March 1934, Churchill was able to invest $5,850 (approximately $101,000 in today’s currency) in National Distillers Products Corp. – the same American company that awarded its New England franchise to Joe Kennedy. Later that year, Winston managed to buy some more of the same stock for $4,375 (about $76,000 in today’s currency).
Soon after both purchases, Winston sold his National Distillers stock, earning a neat little profit, records show. The paperwork for these transactions was handled by the Vickers da Costa brokerage firm, which included Churchill’s brother, Jack, as a stock broker and partner.
Winston’s stake in BMT—the private New York City subway line associated with Kennedy, Baruch, and others in their speculative investment “pool”—was even greater and proved more complex. In the two weeks before Kennedy left for England, September 11–26, 1933, Winston repeatedly bought BMT in batches of 100 shares for a total purchase of $21,725 (approximately $380,000 in today’s currency). Records show no other BMT exchanges for Churchill for another ten days, not until after the visit of the Kennedy entourage to Chartwell. The following day, however, Winston started cashing out. He quickly sold about two-thirds of this stock by October 11, 1933, making a substantial 10 percent profit within just a month of his investment.
The idea for Winston’s BMT stock transaction apparently came from Kennedy’s friend and business associate Bernard Baruch. “I bought seven hundred Brooklyn Manhattan T around 30, sold four hundred around 35, and am sitting on three hundred,” Winston wrote to Baruch on October 15, 1933, shortly after entertaining his American visitors at Chartwell. “Many thanks for the fruitful suggestion.”
Les associés américains avaient prévu de se faire de l’argent une fois que l’achat d’une ligne de métro New Yorkais par la mairie allait se savoir et faire monter leurs actions. Ils invitaient Churchill à prendre part á cette opération pour le convaincre de les soutenir à obtenir un contrat favorable avec les producteurs de whiskey.
Le site americanmafia.com sait que la famille kennedy touche toujours d l’argent grâce à ce contrat.
The Rise & Fall of Organized Crime in America
▻http://www.americanmafia.com/Feature_Articles_418.html
Those who had arranged to import alcohol from overseas became legal distributors after Prohibition ended. The Kennedy Family still gets royalties on every imported bottle of Scotch brought into the United States because of a deal their bootlegger patriarch, Joseph P. Kennedy arranged well before the end of Prohibition.
Alors quelle est la base historique de la fortune des Kennedys ? Il y a la vente de drogues légales, le délit d’initiés, des affaires obscures avec la mafia des années 1920 et d’autres transactions au dépens des autres. Plutôt « The Wolf of Wall Street » que « The Godfather » ? J’ai des doutes.
▻https://www.flickr.com/photos/decoplanet/5244153704
Pourquoi est-ce qu’il est si difficile de trouver la vérité sur les familles riches ? On découvre entre autres méthodes une voloté ferme de leur part d’attirer l’attention du public sur leurs affaires plus croustillantes qu’importantes . Joe Kennedy était connu pour son affaire avec
#Gloria_Swanson, l’histoire de JFK et Marilyn Monroe est légende, il y a les François-Henri Pinault et Salma Hayek, Jean Todt et Michelle Yeoh, et patati et patata ...
Les vraies affaires restent dans l’ombre des archives secrètes.
#prohibition #USA #mafia
