CONTENTS
TITLE PAGE
DEDICATION
AUTHOR’S NOTE
PROLOGUE A BABE IN THE WOODS
BOOK I
CHAPTER 1 A WOLF IN SHEEP’S CLOTHING
CHAPTER 2 THE DUCHESS OF BAY RIDGE
CHAPTER 3 CANDID CAMERA
CHAPTER 4 WASP HEAVEN
CHAPTER 5 THE MOST POWERFUL DRUG
CHAPTER 6 FREEZING REGULATORS
CHAPTER 7 SWEATING THE SMALL STUFF
CHAPTER 8 THE COBBLER
CHAPTER 9 PLAUSIBLE DENIABILITY
CHAPTER 10 THE DEPRAVED CHINAMAN
BOOK II
CHAPTER 11 THE LAND OF RATHOLES
CHAPTER 12 DARK PREMONITIONS
CHAPTER 13 MONEY LAUNDERING 101
CHAPTER 14 INTERNATIONAL OBSESSIONS
CHAPTER 15 THE CONFESSOR
CHAPTER 16 RELAPSE BEHAVIOR
CHAPTER 17 THE MASTER FORGER
CHAPTER 18 FU MANCHU AND THE MULE
CHAPTER 19 A LEAST LIKELY MULE
CHAPTER 20 A CHINK IN THE ARMOR
BOOK III
CHAPTER 21 FORM OVER SUBSTANCE
CHAPTER 22 LUNCHTIME IN THE ALTERNATIVE UNIVERSE
CHAPTER 23 WALKING A FINE LINE
CHAPTER 24 PASSING THE TORCH
CHAPTER 25 REAL REALS
CHAPTER 26 DEAD MEN TELL NO TALES
CHAPTER 27 ONLY THE GOOD DIE YOUNG
CHAPTER 28 IMMORTALIZING THE DEAD
CHAPTER 29 DESPERATE MEASURES
BOOK IV
CHAPTER 30 NEW ADDITIONS
CHAPTER 31 THE JOY OF PARENTHOOD
CHAPTER 32 MORE JOY
CHAPTER 33 REPRIEVES
CHAPTER 34 TRAVELING BADLY
CHAPTER 35 THE STORM BEFORE THE STORM
CHAPTER 36 JAILS, INSTITUTIONS, AND DEATH
CHAPTER 37 SICK AND SICKER
CHAPTER 38 MARTIANS OF THE THIRD REICH
CHAPTER 39 SIX WAYS TO KILL AN INTERVENTIONIST
EPILOGUE THE BETRAYERS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
COPYRIGHT
To my two wonderful children, Chandler and Carter Belfort
AUTHOR’S NOTE
This book is a work of memoir; it is a true story based on my best recollections of various events in my life. Where indicated, the names and identifying characteristics of certain people mentioned in the book have been changed in order to protect their privacy. In some instances, I rearranged and/or compressed events and time periods in service of the narrative, and I recreated dialogue to match my best recollection of those exchanges.
PROLOGUE
A BABE IN THE WOODS
May 1, 1987
You’re lower than pond scum,” said my new boss, leading me through the boardroom of LF Rothschild for the first time. “You got a problem with that, Jordan?”
“No,” I replied, “no problem.”
“Good,” snapped my boss, and he kept right on walking.
We were walking through a maze of brown mahogany desks and black telephone wire on the twenty-third floor of a glass-and-aluminum tower that rose up forty-one stories above Manhattan’s fabled Fifth Avenue. The boardroom was a vast space, perhaps fifty by seventy feet. It was an oppressive space, loaded with desks, telephones, computer monitors, and some very obnoxious yuppies, seventy of them in all. They had their suit jackets off, and at this hour of morning—9:20 a.m.—they were leaning back in their seats, reading their Wall Street Journals, and congratulating themselves on being young Masters of the Universe.
Being a Master of the Universe; it seemed like a noble pursuit, and as I walked past the Masters, in my cheap blue suit and clodhopper shoes, I found myself wishing I were one of them. But my new boss was quick to remind me that I wasn’t. “Your job”—he looked at the plastic nametag on my cheap blue lapel—“Jordan Belfort, is a connector,which means you’ll be dialing the phone five hundred times a day, trying to get past secretaries. You’re not trying to sell anything or recommend anything or create anything. You’re just trying to get business owners on the phone.” He paused for a brief instant, then spewed out more venom. “And when you doget one on the phone, all you’ll say is: ‘Hello, Mr. So and So, I have Scott holding for you,’ and then you pass the phone to me and start dialing again. Think you can handle that, or is that too complicated for you?”
“No, I can handle it,” I said confidently, as a wave of panic overtook me like a killer tsunami. The LF Rothschild training program was six months long. They would be tough months, gruelingmonths, during which I would be at the very mercy of assholes like Scott, the yuppie scumbag who seemed to have bubbled up from the fiery depths of yuppie hell.
Sneaking peaks at him out of the corner of my eye, I came to the quick conclusion that Scott looked like a goldfish. He was bald and pale, and what little hair he did have left was a muddy orange. He was in his early thirties, on the tall side, and he had a narrow skull and pink, puffy lips. He wore a bow tie, which made him look ridiculous. Over his bulging brown eyeballs he wore a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles, which made him look fishy—in the goldfish sense of the word.
“Good,” said the scumbag goldfish. “Now, here are the ground rules: There are no breaks, no personal calls, no sick days, no coming in late, and no loafing off. You get thirty minutes for lunch”—he paused for effect—“and you better be back on time, because there are fifty people waiting to take your desk if you fuck up.”
He kept walking and talking as I followed one step behind, mesmerized by the thousands of orange diode stock quotes that came skidding across gray-colored computer monitors. At the front of the room, a wall of plate glass looked out over midtown Manhattan. Up ahead I could see the Empire State Building. It towered above everything, seeming to rise up to the heavens and scrape the sky. It was a sight to behold, a sight worthy of a young Master of the Universe. And, right now, that goal seemed further and further away.
“To tell you the truth,” sputtered Scott, “I don’t think you’re cut out for this job. You look like a kid, and Wall Street’s no place for kids. It’s a place for killers. A place for mercenaries. So in thatsense you’re lucky I’m not the one who does the hiring around here.” He let out a few ironic chuckles.
I bit my lip and said nothing. The year was 1987, and yuppie assholes like Scott seemed to rule the world. Wall Street was in the midst of a raging bull market, and freshly minted millionaires were being spit out a dime a dozen. Money was cheap, and a guy named Michael Milken had invented something called “junk bonds,” which had changed the way corporate America went about its business. It was a time of unbridled greed, a time of wanton excess. It was the era of the yuppie.
As we neared his desk, my yuppie nemesis turned to me and said, “I’ll say it again, Jordan: You’re the lowest of the low. You’re not even a cold caller yet; you’re a connector.” Disdain dripped off the very word. “And ’til you pass your Series Seven, connecting will be your entire universe. And thatis why you are lower than pond scum. You got a problem with that?”
“Absolutely not,” I replied. “It’s the perfect job for me, because I amlower than pond scum.” I shrugged innocently.