Peter A. Cohen

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Peter A. Cohen
Born1946 or 1947 (age 77–78)
Shearson Lehman American Express
(Chairman & CEO)
SpouseBrooke Goodman
ParentFlorence & Sidney B. Cohen

Peter A. Cohen is the chairman and CEO of Andover National Corporation, a public holding company. He was formerly the chairman and CEO of

Shearson Lehman American Express from 1983 through 1991.[1][3]

Early life and education

Cohen was born and raised on

Long Island, New York. He is of Jewish descent.[4][5] Cohen graduated from Ohio State University in 1968 and received his MBA from Columbia Business School
in 1969.

Career

Cohen began his career on Wall Street at

CBWL-Hayden Stone. In 1973, Cohen was appointed assistant to the firm's chairman, Sanford I. Weill, the architect of a major consolidation of brokerage and investment banking firms in the 1960s and 1970s. Cohen would remain with the firm and was integral to its various mergers in the 1970s, including Shearson, Hammill & Co. and Loeb, Rhoades, Hornblower & Co.[6]
While there he held various positions including CAO, CFO, COO, chairman and CEO.

In 1978, Cohen left Shearson for one year to work for

Republic New York Corporation and the Trade Development Bank before returning to Shearson in 1979. Shearson merged with American Express in 1981 at which time Cohen became president and chief operating officer and in 1983 chairman and chief executive officer. At age 36, Cohen was by far the youngest head of a major Wall Street firm.[3]
Shearson went on to acquire Lehman Brothers Inc. in 1984 and EF Hutton in 1988. During Cohen's career at Shearson, the firm made 24 acquisitions.

In 1988, Cohen was a key player in the

Shearson Lehman supported the company's CEO F. Ross Johnson in a proposed $17 billion buyout.[7][8] Ultimately, Johnson and Cohen lost their bid for the company and RJR Nabisco was acquired by the private equity firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts.[9][10] Cohen was portrayed by Peter Riegert in the 1993 film Barbarians at the Gate depicting the RJR Nabisco buyout.[11]

In 1991, Cohen founded the securities and asset management businesses of Republic National Bank of New York. From November 1992 to May 1994, Cohen was vice chairman and a director of Republic New York.[12] In July 1994, he founded an asset management company, Ramius Capital Group, which grew to $13 billion in assets undermanagement by 2008. In 2009, Ramius acquired Cowen and Co., a 100-year-old biotechnology and technology-focused securities firm where Cohen was chairman and CEO until December 2018 and chairman through June 2019.

In 2019, Cohen retired from Cowen to pursue building new businesses and subsequently started three companies: Peter Cohen LLC, a personal holding company that invests in private and public companies; Difesa Capital Management, an arbitrage investment partnership he started with his son, Andrew Cohen; and Andover National Corporation, a holding company created for the purpose of acquiring essential-service companies.

Over his career, Cohen has served on numerous corporate and philanthropic boards including those of

Telecom Italia, L-3 Corporation, The New York City Opera, The Mount Sinai Medical Center
and the Children's Hearing Institute. He is currently lead director for Scientific Games, chairman of the board of directors of PolarityTE, a biologics company, and a director of Quadrant Biosciences, a diagnostics company built around epigenetics. He is also chairman of the American Museum of Finance and a director of the Gift of Life Marrow Foundation.

Personal life

Cohen has been married twice. His first marriage ended in divorce.[4] He is married to former flight attendant Brooke Goodman;[4][13] they have a daughter.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b Williams, Monci Jo (May 23, 1988). "Brash New Mogul on Wall Street". Fortune (magazine) . Then you can appreciate the yearnings of Peter Cohen, 41, chairman of the Shearson Lehman Hutton brokerage firm
  2. ^ "Cohen's Back, on a Smaller Stage". The Wall Street Journal. November 28, 2009.
  3. ^ a b Vanities on The Bonfire: Peter Cohen. Time, February 12, 1990
  4. ^ a b c d John Rossant (Mar 29, 1999). "The Reincarnation Of Peter Cohen". Bloomberg. But they were also fast friends who were linked by their shared Jewish background: DeBenedetti would talk to Cohen about how he had narrowly escaped the Nazis in World War II.
  5. ^ Inside Philanthropy: "Peter A. Cohen" retrieved September 21, 2017
  6. Cowen Group
    . Retrieved June 10, 2014.
  7. ^ Nabisco Executives Offer $17 Billion for Company. New York Times, October 21, 1988
  8. ^ Shearson Risks, Rewards on RJR Nabisco. New York Times, October 22, 1988
  9. ^ RJR Nabisco Bidders Said to Talk. New York Times, October 26, 1988
  10. ^ The Nabisco Battle's Key Moment. New York Times, December 2, 1988
  11. Internet Movie Database
    . Retrieved August 21, 2014.
  12. ^ "Peter Cohen". Forbes. Archived from the original on October 2, 2012. Retrieved August 21, 2014.
  13. New York Magazine
    . December 22, 1997. p. 26.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Peter_A._Cohen&oldid=1150485277"