TOKYO -- Nikkei Asia has from time to time published the long-standing Nikkei autobiographical series My Personal History, featuring prominent figures from a wide range of fields. The month-long series will return on Thursday with Stephen Schwarzman, chairman and CEO of Blackstone.
He co-founded the company in 1985 and has built it into the world's largest alternative asset manager, with more than $1.3 trillion in assets under management, earning him the nickname the "King of Capital."
His journey, however, has been anything but smooth sailing. Business was slow in Blackstone's early days, and what ultimately came to its rescue was a tide of Japanese money then sweeping the world. Along the way, Schwarzman suffered a humiliating investment failure, faced angry clients and was even reduced to tears. Yet he persevered, building a corporate culture defined by hard work.
Schwarzman has another face, too: that of a behind-the-scenes diplomat. He has served as an intermediary between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping and continues to work to ease tensions between the world's two largest economies. In this series, Schwarzman looks back on a life and career that mirror the history of the United States and the world in the decades since World War II.
