James Family Office Appoints Forman as Chief Investment Officer

Tony James's family office has hired a former money manager for Laurene Powell Jobs. This is after the legendary dealmaker left Blackstone Inc. and is now building his personal holdings.

Daniel Forman joined Jefferson River Capital as chief investment officer late last year. He has worked at Powell Jobs's Emerson Collective for approximately four years, most recently serving as head of asset management. Prior to that, he oversaw the firm's fixed-income investments.

Forman and a representative for Jefferson River both declined to comment when asked about James' departure from Blackstone. James, 71, left the private equity giant at the start of last year after around two decades with the company. He had been president and chief operating officer until 2018, when Jon Gray took over those posts.

James, who used to work for Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette, has become one of the wealthiest people in finance, with a net worth of around $4.3 billion. According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, about a quarter of that wealth is still tied up in Blackstone. James sold more than $1 billion of Blackstone stock during 2021, when it reached a record high. This was his biggest annual disposal in at least a decade, and it has bolstered the family office that he set up in 2016.

Ken Brown, who used to work for equipment manufacturer Roper Industries, has been helping run New York-based Jefferson River for a few years now. Bill Helm, who used to work for Credit Suisse Group AG, joined the firm in 2018 to make real estate investments in the Eastern US. The firm is named after a waterway that runs through the James family's Montana ranch. The firm has also invested in small private equity deals that don't compete with Blackstone investments.

Jefferson River led a group of investors last year in buying US college bookstore operator Follett Higher Education. The group has also participated in venture capital funding rounds and made investments in sports and therapy businesses.

James's departure from Blackstone is the latest sign of a changing of the guard at Wall Street's storied leveraged buyout shops. This leaves Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman, 75, as the lone holdout among a generation of billionaire founders who have recently passed the torch to a younger set of leaders.

Family offices have boomed in number over the past two decades as discrete vehicles to manage the financial affairs of the world’s ultra-rich, partly fueled by surging fortunes in finance and technology. Wealthy individuals from other sectors are also taking more control of their wealth, with New Line Cinema founder Bob Shaye recently establishing his own family office, Lemoko Investments.