Gary Cohn (businessman)
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Gary David Cohn (born August 27, 1960) is an American businessman, investment banker, investor, philanthropist, and politician who served as the 11th Director of the National Economic Council and chief economic advisor to President
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...
from 2017 to 2018. He managed the administration's economic policy agenda. Before serving in the
White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in 1800. ...
, Cohn was president and COO of
Goldman Sachs Goldman Sachs () is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company. Founded in 1869, Goldman Sachs is headquartered at 200 West Street in Lower Manhattan, with regional headquarters in London, Warsaw, Bangalore, H ...
, where he worked for more than 25 years. Cohn was appointed vice-chairman of IBM on January 5, 2021. Following his White House service, Cohn became an advisor and venture capital investor for companies operating in the cybersecurity, blockchain infrastructure, and medical technology sectors. He currently serves on the Board of Advisors for Hoyos Integrity, a startup company employing biometric blockchain technology for secure communications and digital payments, and vice chairman of IBM. Cohn is also the chairman of the advisory board at Pallas Advisors, a national security strategic advisory firm based in Washington, D.C.


Early life and education

Gary Cohn was born to an
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an
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family, the son of Victor and Ellen Cohn, and was raised in Shaker Heights, Ohio. His father was an electrician who later became a real estate developer. Cohn was diagnosed with
dyslexia Dyslexia, also known until the 1960s as word blindness, is a disorder characterized by reading below the expected level for one's age. Different people are affected to different degrees. Problems may include difficulties in spelling words, r ...
at a young age, and attended four schools by the time he reached the sixth grade. Cohn's childhood experiences with dyslexia were a featured case study in '' David and Goliath'' by Malcolm Gladwell. Cohn studied at Gilmour Academy, and attended
American University The American University (AU or American) is a private federally chartered research university in Washington, D.C. Its main campus spans 90 acres (36 ha) on Ward Circle, mostly in the Spring Valley neighborhood of Northwest D.C. AU was charte ...
's Kogod School of Business, where he earned a Bachelor of Science in business administration in 1982.


Career

Cohn started his career at the
U.S. Steel United States Steel Corporation, more commonly known as U.S. Steel, is an American integrated steel producer headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with production operations primarily in the United States of America and in severa ...
home products division in
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. After a few months, he left U.S. Steel and became an
options Option or Options may refer to: Computing *Option key, a key on Apple computer keyboards *Option type, a polymorphic data type in programming languages * Command-line option, an optional parameter to a command *OPTIONS, an HTTP request method ...
dealer in the New York Mercantile Exchange. He taught himself the basics of options by reading about it in the days between meeting the hiring manager and joining the New York Mercantile Exchange.''David and Goliath'' Cohn was hired by
Goldman Sachs Goldman Sachs () is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company. Founded in 1869, Goldman Sachs is headquartered at 200 West Street in Lower Manhattan, with regional headquarters in London, Warsaw, Bangalore, H ...
in 1990 and became a partner at the firm in 1994. In 1996, he was named head of the
commodities In economics, a commodity is an economic good, usually a resource, that has full or substantial fungibility: that is, the market treats instances of the good as equivalent or nearly so with no regard to who produced them. The price of a comm ...
department, and in 2002, he was named the head of the Fixed Income, Currency and Commodities (FICC) division. In 2003, he was named co-head of Equities, and in January 2004, Cohn was named the co-head of global securities businesses. He became president and Co-Chief Operating Officer, and director in June 2006. While at Goldman Sachs, Cohn was also a member of the firm's board of directors and Chairman of the Firmwide Client and Business Standards Committee. In 2010, Cohn testified to
Congress A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of a ...
on the role of Goldman Sachs in the
financial crisis of 2007–2008 Finance is the study and discipline of money, currency and capital assets. It is related to, but not synonymous with economics, the study of production, distribution, and consumption of money, assets, goods and services (the discipline of fi ...
. Cohn testified: "During the two years of the financial crisis, Goldman Sachs lost $1.2 billion in its residential mortgage-related business. We did not 'bet against our clients', and the numbers underscore this fact." On January 5, 2021, Cohn was appointed Vice Chairman of IBM's board of directors.


National Economic Council Director

On January 20, 2017, Cohn took office as Director of the National Economic Council (NEC) in President
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...
's administration, a position which did not require Congressional confirmation. By February 11, 2017, ''The Wall Street Journal'' described Cohn as an "economic-policy powerhouse", and ''The New York Times'' called him Trump's "go-to figure on matters related to jobs, business, and growth". With the confirmation of Trump's nominee for Secretary of Treasury,
Steven Mnuchin Steven Terner Mnuchin ( ; born December 21, 1962) is an American investment banker and film producer who served as the 77th United States secretary of the treasury as part of the Cabinet of Donald Trump from 2017 to 2021. Serving for a full pres ...
, pending in the Senate, Cohn filled in the "personnel vacuum" and pushed "ahead on taxes, infrastructure, financial regulation, and replacing health-care law". In addition to his $285 million Goldman Sachs severance package, Cohn also sold a stake in the
Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Limited (ICBC; ) is a Chinese multinational bank. Founded as a limited company on 1 January 1984, ICBC is a state-owned commercial bank. With capital provided by the Ministry of Finance of China, the ...
, the world's largest bank (), then valued at $16 million. Cohn supports reinstating the Glass-Steagall legislation, which would separate commercial and investment banking. Under the Trump administration, Cohn was cited by the press as a supporter of
globalism Globalism refers to various patterns of meaning beyond the merely international. It is used by political scientists, such as Joseph Nye, to describe "attempts to understand all the interconnections of the modern world—and to highlight patterns ...
, and was given nicknames such as "Globalist Gary" and " Carbon Tax Cohn". Along with
Jared Kushner Jared Corey Kushner (born January 10, 1981) is an American businessman and investor. He served as a senior advisor to 45th U.S. president Donald Trump, his father-in-law. Since leaving the White House, Kushner founded Affinity Partners, a pri ...
, Ivanka Trump, and Dina Powell, they were referred to by opponents as the "Wall Street-wing" of the Trump administration. He was stated as being at odds with the populist faction that was led by Steve Bannon, when Bannon was
White House Chief Strategist Stephen Kevin Bannon (born November 27, 1953) is an American media executive, political strategist, and former investment banker. He served as the White House's chief strategist in the administration of U.S. president Donald Trump during the ...
. Cohn led the Trump administration's efforts to pass the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. In a 2019 article in ''The Wall Street Journal'', Cohn pointed to an increase of $6,000 in real disposable personal income per household, as well as the creation of seven million jobs, as evidence of the success of tax reform. Cohn reportedly considered resigning from the National Economic Council after the 2017
Charlottesville rally The Unite the Right rally was a white supremacist rally that took place in Charlottesville, Virginia, from August 11 to 12, 2017. Marchers included members of the alt-right, neo-Confederates, neo-fascists, white nationalists, Neo-Nazism, neo- ...
and criticized the Trump administration's response to the rally, stating "I believe this administration can and must do better in consistently and unequivocally condemning," white supremacists. In August 2020,
Jim Sciutto James Ernest Sciutto (born March 10, 1970) is an American news anchor and former government official who has been the chief national security correspondent for CNN since September 2013. In this role he provides analysis on a variety of topics con ...
published a book called ''The Madman Theory'' in which Cohn said in response to Donald Trump saying that there were very good people on both sides of the protests which included white supremacists, "Citizens standing up for equality and freedom can never be equated with white supremacists, neo-Nazis, and the KKK." On March 6, 2018, Cohn announced his intention to resign; the announcement followed Trump's proposal to impose import tariffs on steel and aluminum, and Trump's cancellation of a meeting with end-users of steel and aluminum that Cohn had arranged in an attempt to dissuade the president from the planned tariffs. He was replaced by Larry Kudlow on April 2. Bob Woodward's 2018 book, Fear: Trump in the White House relates two instances in which Cohn removed draft letters from President Trump's desk, so that the President would not see them. One of the letters would have canceled a key trade agreement with South Korea, and the other would have withdrawn the US unilaterally from the
NAFTA The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA ; es, Tratado de Libre Comercio de América del Norte, TLCAN; french: Accord de libre-échange nord-américain, ALÉNA) was an agreement signed by Canada, Mexico, and the United States that crea ...
trade agreement with Canada and Mexico.


Venture capital

Following his departure from the White House, Cohn became an advisor and venture capital investor for companies in the cybersecurity, blockchain, and digital payments sectors. He currently serves on the Board of Spring Labs, a startup using blockchain technology to share consumer credit data, and Hoyos Integrity, a company employing biometric blockchain technology for secure communications and mobile payments. Cohn is also a key advisor for Machine Zone and Abryx, a biomaterial science company. At Hoyos Integrity, Cohn is deeply involved in the strategy and rollout of a next-generation secure mobile phone aimed at government and corporate customers. The company is also planning to launch a digital wallet — which employs more sophisticated biometrics — that consumers can use to make payments using a wide range of monetary assets, including bitcoin. The wallet will also be insured up to $1 million if hacked and will adhere to strict Know Your Client (KYC) and Anti Money Laundering (AML) regulations. The underlying technology of Hoyos' digital wallet and FIPS was born out of military-grade digital secure vault technologies. Unlike traditional digital wallets, it is designed to provide significant privacy protections to consumers as it does not mine their data, performs unique biometrics-based identity authentication on every transaction, and holds any digital fiat or cryptocurrency. The Hoyos wallet platform underwent stringent testing by U.S. government security contractors and in an international hackathon contest, and was not breached. In April 2020, Cohn was appointed to the Risk & Governance Advisory Board of Starling, and technology company in applied behavior sciences. In August 2020, Cohn and investor
Clifton S. Robbins Clifton may refer to: People *Clifton (surname) *Clifton (given name) Places Australia *Clifton, Queensland, a town **Shire of Clifton *Clifton, New South Wales, a suburb of Wollongong *Clifton, Western Australia Canada *Clifton, Nova Scotia, ...
launched Cohn Robbins Holdings Corp.


Harvard Kennedy School

In 2019, Cohn served as a visiting fellow at the Institute of Politics at the
Harvard Kennedy School The Harvard Kennedy School (HKS), officially the John F. Kennedy School of Government, is the school of public policy and government of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The school offers master's degrees in public policy, public ...
where he taught a seminar alongside former U.S. Senator Heidi Heitkamp on economic, demographic, and national security policy. Cohn and Heitkamp focused on structural economic and demographic issues. Spring 2019 Fellows at the Institute included Mayor Andrew Gillum, Rep. Carlos Curbelo, and Mayor Mitch Landrieu. While at Harvard, Cohn was the lead sponsor for the Road to 2092: Save Social Security, the first policy hackathon organized by the Harvard Institute of Politics. The competition featured over 250 students from 28 universities; the winning team presented their policy brief at the U.S. Capitol, the White House, and was also featured on MSNBC.


Personal life

Cohn is married to Lisa Pevaroff-Cohn. They have three daughters, and reside in
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
.


Philanthropy

Cohn and his wife are founding board members of the
New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, the ...
Child Study Center. The couple funded the Pevaroff Cohn Professorship in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the
New York University School of Medicine NYU Grossman School of Medicine is a medical school of New York University, a private research university in New York City. It was founded in 1841 and is one of two medical schools of the university, with the other being the Long Island School of ...
in 1999. He financed the Gary D. Cohn Endowed Goldman Sachs Chair in Finance and the Gary D. Cohn Scholarship both at American University, his alma mater. In 2015 Cohn financed the Gary D. Cohn and Brother Robert LaVelle Endowed Scholarship in honor of Brother Robert LaVelle, who was retiring after 35 years as head of Gilmour Academy, where Cohn attended high school. In 2009, the
Hillel International Hillel: The Foundation for Jewish Campus Life, also known as Hillel International or Hillel, is the largest Jewish campus organization in the world, working with thousands of college students globally. Hillel is represented at more than 550 colle ...
building at
Kent State University Kent State University (KSU) is a public research university in Kent, Ohio. The university also includes seven regional campuses in Northeast Ohio and additional facilities in the region and internationally. Regional campuses are located in As ...
was named the Cohn Jewish Student Center in recognition of a gift from Cohn and his wife. It is the first Hillel building built directly on the campus of a state university. Cohn has been a supporter of
Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities (RBI) is a youth baseball program operated by Major League Baseball. This youth initiative is designed to provide young people from underserved and diverse communities the opportunity to play baseball and softba ...
, and has supported the nonprofit youth development organization Harlem RBI (now called DREAM) since 2011. At that time, Harlem RBI was given the chance to build its own charter school. Mark Teixeira of the
New York Yankees The New York Yankees are an American professional baseball team based in the Boroughs of New York City, New York City borough of the Bronx. The Yankees compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Amer ...
and Harlem RBI director Rich Berlin asked Cohn if he could help them raise the capital they needed to build the school. On June 17, 2013, Cohn was honored at the annual "Bids for Kids" gala in order to raise funds for Harlem RBI. Cohn said in an interview that Harlem RBI is a project that is "very near and dear to his heart". In 2015, Cohn won $360,000 for Harlem RBI as winner of Bloomberg's Brackets for a Cause competition.


Memberships

Cohn is active in various charitable causes related to education and healthcare. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of NYU Langone Health and on the Board of Overseers of the NYU Tandon School of Engineering.Board of Overseers
/ref> In 2010, the Hospital for Joint Diseases at
NYU Langone Medical Center NYU Langone Health is an academic medical center located in New York City, New York, United States. The health system consists of NYU Grossman School of Medicine and NYU Long Island School of Medicine, both part of New York University (NYU), and m ...
named Cohn the chairman of the HJD Advisory Board. Cohn has served as a
trustee Trustee (or the holding of a trusteeship) is a legal term which, in its broadest sense, is a synonym for anyone in a position of trust and so can refer to any individual who holds property, authority, or a position of trust or responsibility to t ...
of American University and Gilmour Academy.


References


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Cohn, Gary 1960 births American chief operating officers American derivatives traders American financiers American investment bankers American investors Businesspeople from New York City Businesspeople from Ohio Directors of Goldman Sachs Jewish American bankers Jewish American philanthropists Kogod School of Business alumni Living people New York (state) Democrats Ohio Democrats People named in the Paradise Papers People with dyslexia Philanthropists from New York (state) Politicians from Shaker Heights, Ohio Trump administration personnel Venture capital