My guest today has written definitive histories of three of Wall Street's most consequential firms: Lazard, Bear Stearns, and Goldman Sachs. He spent seventeen years as an investment banker before becoming one of the most well known financial journalists in the country, and he's a founding partner at Puck. Now he's turned his attention to Apollo Global Management, and the story of how Marc Rowan quietly rewired the entire banking system. William Cohan joins me to talk about that new book, his old friendship with JFK Jr., and what two decades on Wall Street taught him about power.

William D. Cohan is a former senior Wall Street M&A investment banker (Lazard, Merrill Lynch, JPMorgan) and the New York Times bestselling author of five non-fiction books, including Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World; House of Cards: A Tale of Hubris and Wretched Excess on Wall Street; and, The Last Tycoons: The Secret History of Lazard Frères & Co., the winner of the 2007 FT/Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award. His work has appeared in Vanity Fair, The New York Times, Financial Times, and more. Cohan is a founding partner of Puck and a writer-at-large for Air Mail. He is a graduate of Andover, and holds degrees from Duke, the Columbia School of Journalism, and Columbia Business School.

Money to Burn: Leon Black, Apollo and the Remaking of Wall Street: https://www.amazon.com/Money-Burn-Apollo-Remaking-Street-ebook/dp/B0GX2TSKRM

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NOTE: This podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Anything said by the guests or host should not be construed as legal or investment advice. Thanks for listening.

Joe Reilly is the head of Circulus Group, a family office network, and the host of The Inheritance Podcast.

FOLLOW JOE: https://twitter.com/joereillyjr

WEBSITE: https://circulus.substack.com/

INHERITANCE PODCAST: https://open.spotify.com/show/3R4k3mw1blnV1vgye6iYjF

If you like this show, leave us a rating or review. I appreciate it.

S5E15

©2026 Joe Reilly

Charley Ellis is one of the most respected figures in institutional investing, the founder of Greenwich Associates, former chair of Yale's investment committee, and author of more than a dozen books, including Winning the Loser's Game, which has sold over a million copies, and his acclaimed histories of Goldman Sachs, Xerox, Vanguard, and Capital Group. Over a career spanning six decades, he has combined a practitioner's experience with a historian's eye, chronicling not just what great investors did, but why their organizations rose to the top.

In our conversation, Ellis recounts some of the major figures of the last 60 years, many of whom he knew personally: J. Richardson Dilworth, who gave him his start managing Rockefeller family wealth; Xerox's Joe Wilson; Goldman Sachs leaders John Whitehead and John Weinberg; quant pioneer Fisher Black and his champion Bob Rubin; Sidney Weinberg and his unlikely friend Paul Cabot; Harvard's Walter Cabot and Jack Meyer; Yale's David Swensen; Vanguard founder Jack Bogle; and mentors Peter Bernstein and Peter Drucker. The result is a rare, firsthand account of how character, culture, and discipline built the institutions that still define the investment world today. But first, I had to ask him about his art teacher, Joseph Albers, whose famous color theory course at Yale in the 1950s shaped his early thinking on discipline and perception. Please enjoy my conversation with Charley Ellis.

The Seven Keys Framework

1. Mission — A clear and unifying purpose that guides every decision the firm makes.
2. Culture — Shared values and behaviors that define how people work together.
3. Recruiting — Finding and hiring only the most talented and compatible individuals.
4. Developing People — Continuously training and improving the skills of team members.
5. Client Focus — Putting the client's needs and long-term success first.
6. Innovation — Constantly adapting and improving services and operations.
7. Leadership — Guiding the organization with integrity, clarity, and long-term vision.

Winning the Losers Game: https://www.amazon.com/Winning-Losers-Game-Fifth-Strategies/dp/0071545492

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NOTE: This podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Anything said by the guests or host should not be construed as legal or investment advice. Thanks for listening.

Joe Reilly is the head of Circulus Group, a family office network, and the host of The Inheritance Podcast.

FOLLOW JOE: https://twitter.com/joereillyjr

WEBSITE: https://circulus.substack.com/

INHERITANCE PODCAST: https://open.spotify.com/show/3R4k3mw1blnV1vgye6iYjF

If you like this show, leave us a rating or review. I appreciate it.

S5E14

©2026 Joe Reilly

Today Joe is joined by Michael Gross, CEO and President of SLR Investment Corporation, who was present at the birth of Apollo. Michael co-founded SLR alongside Bruce Spohler in 2006, and the firm now manages roughly $14 billion across cashflow lending, asset-based lending, life science lending, and specialty finance. Before SLR, Michael was a founding partner of Apollo Global Management, where he launched Apollo's first BDC and helped build its credit platform from the ground up. He got his start at Drexel Burnham Lambert in 1987, working under Leon Black in the M&A department. Michael expects rising defaults in private credit as 2021-vintage loans, underwritten with weak covenants and high leverage, come up to maturity. We also discuss the early days of Apollo, raising the first significant BDC in 2004 which launched the massive growth in the industry, and how SLR seeks complexity as a competitive edge.

Michael Gross is the Co-Chief Executive Officer and President of the SLR, bringing more than 30 years of experience in private equity, distressed debt, and mezzanine lending. A founder and former senior partner of Apollo Management, he played a key role in building one of the industry's leading private equity firms and helped oversee investments totaling more than $13 billion across 150 companies. Earlier in his career, he worked in mergers and acquisitions at Drexel Burnham Lambert. He holds degrees from the University of Michigan and Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management.

Throughout his adult life to present day, Michael has been a vigorous philanthropist. He currently serves as co-chair of the Mount Sinai Children's Center Foundation, and has served on the Board of Directors of New York Road Runners for over a decade, playing a vital role in the creation of the first youth running events. Michael also serves on the University of Michigan Ross School Advisory Board, and the Northwestern University Kellogg Global Advisory Board. In 2019 Michael was an honoree at the NYRR Night of Champions, receiving the Civic Champion award.

Please enjoy my conversation with Michael Gross.

SLR Investment Corporation: https://slrinvestmentcorp.com

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NOTE: This podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Anything said by the guests or host should not be construed as legal or investment advice. Thanks for listening.

Joe Reilly is the head of Circulus Group, a family office network, and the host of The Inheritance Podcast.

FOLLOW JOE: https://twitter.com/joereillyjr

WEBSITE: https://circulus.substack.com/

INHERITANCE PODCAST: https://open.spotify.com/show/3R4k3mw1blnV1vgye6iYjF

If you like this show, leave us a rating or review. I appreciate it.

S5E12

©2026 Joe Reilly

Divya Narendra has spent his career at the intersection of finance and innovation. Divya is the Chief Executive Officer and Founder of SumZero, the world's largest community for professional investors, which he founded in 2008. Divya is also a Managing Partner of SumZero Capital, a private fund that uses AI to invest in public equities recommended by the SumZero investment community. He has been a member of the Board of Directors of Gemini Trust Company, started by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, a digital asset exchange which IPO'd in September 2025. Divya was previously an associate at Sowood Capital Management, a multi-strategy hedge fund, and prior to that, he was an analyst in the M&A Group at Credit Suisse in New York. He was also the original founder of ConnectU, the predecessor to Facebook, and was portrayed by actor Max Minghella in the Oscar-winning Hollywood movie, The Social Network. Divya received a BA in Applied Mathematics from Harvard and a JD/MBA from Northwestern University.

We were very pleased to have Divya keynote one of our recent events in New York. Please enjoy our conversation.

SumZero: https://www.sumzero.com

If you like these discussions, please subscribe or leave a review.

NOTE: This podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Anything said by the guests or host should not be construed as legal or investment advice. Thanks for listening.

Joe Reilly is the head of Circulus Group, a family office network, and the host of The Inheritance Podcast.

FOLLOW JOE: https://twitter.com/joereillyjr

WEBSITE: https://circulus.substack.com/

INHERITANCE PODCAST: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-inheritance-podcast/id1644964

If you like this show, leave us a rating or review. I appreciate it.

S5E12

©2026 Joe Reilly

"The Trifecta of learning throughout your life is always have great teachers, great partners personally and professionally and great students to teach."

Today's podcast is with Mitch Julis, the legendary co-founder of Canyon Partners. Mitch was the keynote at the Circulus Family Office Summit in the fall of 2025. We talked about his background in the Bronx, how Lowell Milken took a chance on a young lawyer, his years at Drexel under Mike Milken, starting his own firm with his business school roommate Josh Friedman, the debt landscape today, and his fascinating concept of structural alpha. We were all pleased to be a student of Mitch Julis that afternoon, and I know you will enjoy the talk as well.

Mitch Julis is Co-Founder, Co-Chairman, and Co-CEO of Canyon Partners, a $28 billion multi-strategy alternative asset manager with a strong emphasis on credit and special situations. He previously led a distressed and special situations team at Drexel Burnham Lambert and practiced bankruptcy and creditors' rights law at Wachtell. He has published extensively on bankruptcy and distressed investing. Mr. Julis holds degrees from Princeton University, magna cum laude, Harvard Law School, magna cum laude, Harvard Business School, and received an honorary doctorate from Yeshiva University.

He and Co-Founder Josh Friedman received Institutional Investor's "Lifetime Achievement" Award in 2014. Mr. Julis is a trustee of Brown University, a trustee of Yeshiva University, and a trustee emeritus at the Asia Society. He previously served as a trustee at Princeton University and the Lincoln Center Theater. He is also noteworthy in helping to establish the Harvard Law School Program on Jewish and Israeli Law and received an Honorary Fellowship from the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology.

Please enjoy my conversation with Mitch Julis.

Canyon Partners: https://www.canyonpartners.com/our-team/

If you like these discussions, please subscribe or leave a review.

NOTE: This podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Anything said by the guests or host should not be construed as legal or investment advice. Thanks for listening.

Joe Reilly is the head of Circulus Group, a family office network, and the host of The Inheritance Podcast.

FOLLOW JOE: https://twitter.com/joereillyjr

WEBSITE: https://circulus.substack.com/

INHERITANCE PODCAST: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-inheritance-podcast/id1644964

If you like this show, leave us a rating or review. I appreciate it.

S5E11

©2026 Joe Reilly

Everyone knows about liar's poker, but do you know about the other game played by the Salomon traders?

Today's guest is Curtis Arledge, Chairman and CEO of Mariner Investment Group, a $10 billion multi-strategy fund based in New York. He started his career studying lasers at Princeton before finding himself at the epicenter of the mortgage-backed securities boom at Salomon Brothers. He was an early employee of BlackRock and served as CEO of BNY Mellon's investment management arm. Join us for a deep dive as we discuss the fax machine era of trading, the other game played by the Liar's Poker desk at Solly, and why he believes the 40-year tailwind of falling interest rates has finally come to an end. Curtis is obsessed with investment talent and has lots of great lessons in this interview.

Curtis Arledge is Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Mariner Investment Group and a member of the Firm's Management and Risk Committees. A founding member of Mariner, Mr. Arledge returned to the Firm in 2019 and is responsible for overseeing all aspects of the business and developing new business lines. Mr. Arledge previously served as the CEO of BNY Mellon Investment Management and was also responsible for the firm's Markets Group. Prior to BNY Mellon, he was the chief investment officer for fundamental fixed income portfolios at BlackRock, Inc. Mr. Arledge also worked as senior research associate with the Forum for Growth & Innovation at Harvard Business School. A graduate of Princeton University with a B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering, Mr. Arledge is an Advisory Council member at Princeton's Bendheim Center for Finance. He previously served as Vice Chairman of the U.S. Treasury Borrowing Advisory Committee and was inducted into the Fixed Income Analysts Society Hall of Fame in 2014. Mr. Arledge is a senior independent non-executive Director of Soter Holdings Limited, parent company to Soter Insurance Limited, a provider of specialized insurance products tailored to the digital asset economy, as well as a member of the Advisory Board for NEWITY, an SBA Lender for small businesses.

Please enjoy my conversation with Curtis Arledge.

Mariner Investment Group: https://www.marinerinvestment.com/about

If you like these discussions, please subscribe or leave a review.

NOTE: This podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Anything said by the guests or host should not be construed as legal or investment advice. Thanks for listening.

Joe Reilly is the head of Circulus Group, a family office network, and the host of The Inheritance Podcast.

FOLLOW JOE: https://twitter.com/joereillyjr

WEBSITE: https://circulus.substack.com/

INHERITANCE PODCAST: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-inheritance-podcast/id1644964

If you like this show, leave us a rating or review. I appreciate it.

S5E10

©2026 Joe Reilly

Today, we are joined by Laurence Russian, a Founding Partner at ABS Global Investments, which manages more than $12 billion in assets. Laurence's career began at the legendary Brazilian investment bank Banco Garantia, the predecessor to 3G Capital. After a tenure at Credit Suisse, Laurence and his partners struck out on their own in 2002 to build a firm that prioritizes specialist expertise over generalist breadth.

In this episode, we trace the 22-year evolution of ABS into a data-driven powerhouse managing billions for some of the world's largest pension plans. While many firms rely on off-the-shelf data, Laurence and his team built their own ecosystem to track specialists in everything from Taiwanese semiconductors to Middle Eastern fintech.

Today, we dive into the convergence of public and private markets, exploring why ABS is taking significant stakes in late-stage giants like OpenAI, Anthropic, and Cerebras. We discuss the "Goldman Sachs of Brazil" influence, the art of firing managers, and why local boots on the ground are the only way to find true alpha in emerging markets.

Please enjoy my conversation with Laurence Russian.

Laurence Russian is a Founding Partner and Portfolio Manager at ABS Global Investments. He is a member of the firm's Management Committee and Operating Committee. Prior to co-founding ABS, Mr. Russian was a Director in the Alternative Investments Group at Credit Suisse Asset Management. He joined the firm in 1998 following Credit Suisse Group's acquisition of Garantia.

Mr. Russian joined Banco de Investimentos Garantia in 1994 to help build the firm's alternative asset management business. He began his career in 1993 at Scudder, Stevens & Clark.

He holds a BA in Economics from Ohio Wesleyan University and an MBA in Finance from New York University Stern School of Business. He is also a CFA charterholder.

ABS Global Investments: https://www.absinv.com/

If you like these discussions, please subscribe or leave a review.

NOTE: This podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Anything said by the guests or host should not be construed as legal or investment advice. Thanks for listening.

Joe Reilly is the head of Circulus Group, a family office network, and the host of The Inheritance Podcast.

FOLLOW JOE: https://twitter.com/joereillyjr

WEBSITE: https://circulus.substack.com/

INHERITANCE PODCAST: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-inheritance-podcast/id1644964

If you like this show, leave us a rating or review. I appreciate it.

S5E9

©2026 Joe Reilly

We have a special bonus episode today taking you behind the scenes to discuss what makes a good podcast guest. I chatted with Deirdre Bolton, who has a long background in television and now coaches some of the world's top CEOs for media appearances at Prosek Partners. We talked about the differences between tv and podcasts and how you can be effective on both.

Most people think being a great interview guest is just about having something smart to say. But the reality is, what works on TV can completely fall apart in a podcast, and vice versa. We dig into what separates good guests from great ones and why the best communicators approach these formats in totally different ways.

On TV, that preparation shows up as clarity and discipline, the ability to lead with the headline and make every second count. In podcasting, it shows up as depth, the willingness to unpack ideas, show your thinking, and let the audience see how you arrive at conclusions.

But in both cases, the best guests do the same thing: they do the work ahead of time so they can sound natural when it matters. They know their material, they've thought through their stories, and they're willing to be candid enough to actually share what makes them special.

Deirdre Bolton is Partner and Head of Executive Development at Prosek Partners, where she works with CEOs, founders, and senior executives to sharpen their communication for high-stakes moments. A former TV anchor and journalist at ABC News, Fox Business Network, and Bloomberg TV, she's known for translating complex financial and economic topics into clear, accessible narratives. At ABC News, she covered major global events including the pandemic's economic impact and the war in Europe, and throughout her career has reported on defining moments such as the 2008 financial crisis and launched Bloomberg's "Money Moves with Deirdre Bolton," focused on capital flows into alternative assets. She began her career on Wall Street as an institutional equity sales trader before moving into broadcast journalism.

Please enjoy my discussion with Deirdre Bolton.

Deirdre Bolton: https://www.prosek.com/our-people/deirdre-bolton/

If you like these discussions, please subscribe or leave a review.

NOTE: This podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Anything said by the guests or host should not be construed as legal or investment advice. Thanks for listening.

Joe Reilly is the head of Circulus Group, a family office network, and the host of The Inheritance Podcast.

FOLLOW JOE: https://twitter.com/joereillyjr

WEBSITE: https://circulus.substack.com/

INHERITANCE PODCAST: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-inheritance-podcast/id1644964

If you like this show, leave us a rating or review. I appreciate it.

S5E8

©2026 Joe Reilly

Peter Kraus has occupied a front-row seat to the transformation of modern finance. His journey began not on a trading floor, but in the rigorous world of accounting at Peat Marwick, where he consulted on the bankruptcy of New York City and the historic breakup of AT&T. That foundation led him to a legendary 22-year run at Goldman Sachs, where he rose from a mortgage securities pioneer to Co-Head of GSAM and a key architect of the firm's strategy. He then spent a decade rebuilding AllianceBernstein after they lost half their assets in 2008. Along the way, he and his wife Jill have become two of the world's largest contemporary art collectors. In this episode, he joins us to reflect on forty years of institutional history, the shift from agency-led to counterparty-led banking, how he went from hating to loving the art of Rudy Stingel, and why his latest venture, Aperture Investors, is the culmination of a lifelong search for the perfect alignment between manager and client.

Peter Kraus is the Chairman and CEO of Aperture. For over four decades, Peter has worked at major financial institutions, including Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, and most recently at AllianceBernstein, where he served as Chairman and CEO, successfully leading the firm's turnaround after the crisis in 2008. Throughout his career, Peter has been a vocal proponent of pay-for-performance compensation models and the need for trust between active managers and their clients. After years of watching diminishing returns and increasing outflows, he concluded that a disruptive idea like performance-linked fees would only be successful in an entirely new firm, one built from scratch with client performance as its primary objective. As a result, in 2018, Peter partnered with Generali to launch Aperture Investors. Peter serves on the boards of multiple organizations, including Chairman of the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, the co-founder of the Kraus Family Foundation, a non-profit that supports public art and emerging artists, and Chairman of Marstone LLC. Peter received his B.A. in economics from Trinity College and his M.B.A. from NYU's Stern School of Business.

Please enjoy my conversation with Peter Kraus.

Aperture Investors: https://apertureinvestors.com/bio/peter-kraus

If you like these discussions, please subscribe or leave a review.

NOTE: This podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Anything said by the guests or host should not be construed as legal or investment advice. Thanks for listening.

Joe Reilly is the head of Circulus Group, a family office network, and the host of The Inheritance Podcast.

FOLLOW JOE: https://twitter.com/joereillyjr

WEBSITE: https://circulus.substack.com/

INHERITANCE PODCAST: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-inheritance-podcast/id1644964

If you like this show, leave us a rating or review. I appreciate it.

S5E7

©2026 Joe Reilly

Sebastian Mallaby, a British journalist, author, and senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, is renowned for his expertise in international economics, finance, and in-depth biographies. He has been a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist and has authored notable books such as "The Power Law: Venture Capital and the Making of the New Future," "More Money Than God: Hedge Funds and the Making of a New Elite," and biographies of Alan Greenspan and James Wolfensohn.

Four years ago, I had the pleasure of interviewing Sebastian on the inaugural episode of the Private Capital podcast, where we discussed "The Power Law." I was particularly intrigued by his latest book, The Infinity Machine. In this book, Sebastian delves into the life of the chess prodigy, founder of DeepMind, and Nobel Prize winner, Demis Hassabis. He provides a comprehensive account of the history of artificial intelligence leading up to the groundbreaking release of ChatGPT by DeepMind's competitor, OpenAI. Sebastian meticulously documents the significant battle between the tech giants that ensued.

Sebastian's writing process is intense, and he possesses a remarkable talent for simplifying the complexities of various fields, including hedge funds, venture capital, the World Bank, the Federal Reserve, and now AI. The Infinity Machine stands out as one of the most insightful and thought-provoking books I've read on AI and its far-reaching implications, especially his conviction that OpenAI will probably go bust.

Please enjoy my conversation with Sebastian Mallaby.

Buy the book: The Infinity Machine: Demis Hassabis, DeepMind, and the Quest for Superintelligence

If you like these discussions, please subscribe or leave a review.

NOTE: This podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Anything said by the guests or host should not be construed as legal or investment advice. Thanks for listening.

Joe Reilly is the head of Circulus Group, a family office network, and the host of The Inheritance Podcast.

FOLLOW JOE: https://twitter.com/joereillyjr

WEBSITE: https://circulus.substack.com/

INHERITANCE PODCAST: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-inheritance-podcast/id1644964

If you like this show, leave us a rating or review. I appreciate it.

S5E6

©2026 Joe Reilly