The Wolf of Wall Street
Ugh, where to start… you might not believe me, but I still haven’t watched the film “The Wolf of Wall Street”! The reason is this book. I wanted to read it first. I’ve had it for years, but I kept putting off reading it, even though everyone praises the book as something that should be read by anyone interested in business in any form.
To be honest, Jordan Belfort didn’t leave much of a “wow” impression on me. Moreover, as I progressed through the book, I felt increasingly sorry for him as a person.
Don’t doubt it, Jordan Belfort is a very intelligent man, very cunning and certainly doesn’t hold (current) sales courses without reason. He has the “gift of gab” or “spiel” that he can sell to people… better said, with which he can manipulate people.
Realizing that by manipulating people and information he could achieve a lot, he first started as a nobody on Wall Street. However, he soon realized that by convincing people to buy stocks that have no real value and neither do their companies (so-called penny-stock), and then manipulating those values, he could rake in big money. Especially if you play in the gray, murky zone, and try to exploit the imperfection of American regulations (understand, here we’re not really talking about the classic “loophole” style of play, which is the domain of resourcefulness, but about a gray zone that’s so black that one wrong step separates you from jail for at least 10-20 years). And because of that, he created the investment firm Stratton Oakmont.
In the book “The Wolf of Wall Street” we’ll see how Jordan’s life went during those few years working at Stratton Oakmont, and after he left it (but still remained in the business world). We’ll see how he came to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars without blinking (and we’re talking about the nineties), and became the famous “millionaire who spent a million dollars a day.” We’ll see how he and his (so-called) loyal partners and friends devised plans to create even more money through fraud (pardon, “business moves”), while constantly getting drunk and taking drugs so much that even a seasoned drug addict would have a stroke seeing what they’re doing (if you didn’t know what Quaaludes were until now, after this book you’ll be able to write a term paper, and maybe even a master’s thesis on the subject), and were constantly in the company of a bunch of prostitutes, while the FBI, CIA, SEC, NASDAQ, drug dealers, police were constantly breathing down their necks… in other words, everyone except the Vatican and their inquisitors who eliminate vampires.
There we’ll also see his relationship with his second wife, the gorgeous Nadine (called the “Duchess”) who herself had a strange relationship with him ranging from obsessive love, through psychological abuse/manipulation to hatred.
We’ll see where he traveled, what crazy things he did – how he tried to transfer money to Switzerland, (bought and) drove all kinds of crazy cars and villas and yachts, chased various prostitutes, tried to connect with various (dangerous) people, threw wild parties, flew helicopters – and did all this while high on drugs.
A good part of the book is devoted to his partnership with Steve Madden (girls will probably know this name) and the IPO of the company of the same name, which was one of the causes of his downfall.
And there will (occasionally) be some bright moments that he spent with his children and the fears he experienced because of them, whom he adored madly and tried (as much as possible) to protect them from his dark side.
Now… is this book worth it or not? To tell you the truth, you won’t get a straightforward “YES” answer from me, but that doesn’t mean the book is bad. Here’s what it’s about…
The book is definitely instructive. It shows you what happens if you turn to dark deeds and the idea of quick money.
In fact, I think you’ll better understand what I mean by this if I describe how I experienced Jordan Belfort.
To be honest, I’ll start with the conclusion. I think he hasn’t changed in his soul at all (although he says he has). If I had to name one of his virtues, it would be intelligence and some soft skills related to sales. And that’s where I’d stop with the positives… because I couldn’t find anything more. His psychological profile would be that he’s a narcissistic, egocentric, greedy, manipulative person (who sees both friends and enemies as pawns), who is also extremely insecure (he actually has very low self-confidence, and what he presents as confidence is just a mask) and craves recognition, is extremely vain and easily hurt (it bothers him when someone calls him “small” or doesn’t consider him a hero). He wants everyone to see him as “The Wolf of Wall Street.”
At the same time, he’s a serious drug addict (who went so far as to find ways to combine drugs to try to function somewhat for work). He literally would drool and lose consciousness and not remember what happened; although it should be cool for us men what kind of women (i.e., prostitutes, and several of them) he took to bed and had orgies with (even where there were a large number of participants), in the end you only see one sexually frustrated and deviant man, so that even your deepest fantasies look like innocent role-play. And on the other hand, he can’t sexually satisfy his wife for more than 10 seconds (whom he describes in such superlatives, primarily those related to her appearance, and who is obviously perverted herself, that you simply wonder if it’s possible he’s already become tired of her, which I’m not really convinced of). To be honest, I didn’t really feel the desire to envy a man who’s high 99% of the time, so he doesn’t know what he’s doing half the time. I really didn’t see anything that exudes “macho” or “alpha male” or authority. He only has money… whose potential he apparently didn’t use the right way.
And lest there be confusion, this is just my honest opinion, not at all “colored” by something, like I’m jealous of what he did or how much money he has. I’m seriously telling you, I’m not an envious person, and even if I wanted to be envious, there are better examples of rich “bad boys” who had crazy adventures with beautiful women, but weren’t (such) wretches. Although Belfort himself (as well as many people close to him) says about himself that he was “sick.”
Since we’re already mentioning his wife, the “Duchess” (for whom he left his previous wife, whose kindness and love he apparently never got over), even there the relationship isn’t clear. Until the last moment it’s not clear to you whether she really loves him that obsessively (and then hates him) because of him himself or because of the money. According to his writing, she really loved him (she gave birth to two children, was always attractive for him and supposedly never cheated on him), but she also constantly criticized him, humiliated him, diminished his sense of masculinity, and on the other hand constantly sexually provoked him and manipulated him. I mean, of course, every couple has some of their own disagreements and fetishes, but this really seemed twisted in the book “The Wolf of Wall Street.” And why did everything remain only at criticism of his infidelities and constant drug use? In fact, the two of them developed some kind of toxic dependency, where you don’t know if the sicker person (I mean both in terms of health and psychological sense) is the one with problems, or the other side who stays with such a person but thinks they’re “helping” by tolerating the situation and constantly believing their lies.
Of course, there’s also the famous Quaaludes. Here you’ll read so much about it that you’ll be sick of it. Our Wolf of Wall Street did have back problems, and maybe at the beginning it calmed his pain a little, but he also used that same pain as an “excuse” for drug use. Dude, if the doctor tells you that a glass of red wine in the evening is good for the heart, five glasses in a row certainly won’t have five times more effective results.
Those rare moments when children are his world are also mentioned, and when it seems that he comes to his senses momentarily, but is that really the case? No one has instructions on how to be a parent, but you can’t try to hide your true face from children, they discover it sooner or later. And apparently they saw quite a bit.
Of course, a large part of the book is devoted to his plans for manipulating the stock market and his associates, and ways to increase or hide money from various investigations. There are also bribes, blackmail and much more.
There’s also the final part when he managed to get clean from drugs, but those brief moments of peace are quickly interrupted and everything he did comes due in the form of the FBI and agent Coleman (who throughout the book is only occasionally mentioned as someone who constantly watches Jordan and just waits for an opportunity to bust him) and serving a prison sentence.
I repeat, what I’m about to say is my opinion based on the book, what I’ve read a little about him and listened to some of his seminars/presentations. I’m the first advocate that everyone deserves a second chance, that many people really try to change, but it’s not immediately visible, they need time, help, rehabilitation… But I didn’t get that “feeling” that this man really changed. You know, while reading the book, I often came across his comments “I know I was arrogant, scum, I realize I shouldn’t have done that, I knew it was wrong, etc…”, but I could simply imagine him writing with a smile when he talks about what drugs he used and in what quantities (although I’m not a drug expert, I think it’s impossible that he took all those quantities, because throughout the book he should have ended up in a coma 24 times and died at least seven times), to simply think that he’s bragging here, just like when he writes about his trophy “Duchess,” or how he imagined himself as Bond or Don Johnson and therefore bought fancy cars.
And his “friends” are a special story. Belfort is apparently real proof of that saying “you are the average of your five friends.”
And one more thing. If you’re a young person who thinks such a wild life full of money and orgies is cool and that you want to be like that… there’s a high probability you’ll end up working for someone like Jordan Belfort. He masterfully manipulated young people, convinced them that drugs and orgies were good for them, that it stimulates focus, so they can make phone calls for him until they pass out, to have a sharp approach toward clients and literally instill fear and panic in a person so that if they don’t invest now, they’ll miss an opportunity they’ll regret for the rest of their lives (when in reality these were subtle lies). He pushed them to find ways to take money from people, and thus earn big bonuses, which they would then spend on crazy cars and villas and women and drugs, and then, to maintain such a lifestyle (and pay installments on loans for all the things they bought), they would continue making phone calls wildly, to get their bonuses again, and so on in a circle… and the Wolf of Wall Street and his crew took the real, serious money. So you think about it.
And yes… if you’ve ever wondered about those people who might call you and ask if you’d like to take advantage of an “opportunity for potential earnings by trading by predicting stock price movements (CFDs), and that now is the right time to do it with oil due to the political situation regarding US-Russia relations or ‘Tesla’ due to the release of a new model, and that by investing only symbolic amounts of money, like 20-50 dollars”… think about these words for a moment. Believe me, it’s a similar principle. The point is that in the end you never see your money. Don’t ask me how I know that, (index finger across lips) shhhhhh…
The writing style varies. Our Wolf of Wall Street isn’t a writer at heart, so the pace will vary, and there’s a high probability that some parts might be boring for you (especially if you’re not interested in the stock market). A lot of it also seems like exaggeration, although it seems he’s trying to mask it under the guise of honesty (again my subjective impression). However, the situation improves in the second part of the book.
All in all, it wouldn’t be bad to read this book. I think it will give you some insights into what’s really important in life, as well as what the price is of playing with business rules. And this book is a nice example of how “short-term impulsive pleasures bring long-term consequences.”
So, if you’re ready for 500 pages of a twisted roller coaster, go right ahead.
I’m more interested in the film now… 🙂
And you, dear reader, could you be “The Wolf of Wall Street”? 🙂
Jordan Belfort’s website
Book price: Finesa | Delfi | Vulkan | Makart
Ratings (and purchase) on foreign sites: Goodreads | Amazon | Bookdepository | Audible | Waterstones | Penguin Random House
