According to Publisher’s Weekly, @gselevator says he will sue the publisher “100 times over” if they try to get back the book advance they gave him. Nothing sounds more appealing to another publisher. For a guy who has made a living off of 140 characters or less, you’d think he’d be more careful with his words. Why not just go into your next pitch meeting and say, “Look I’d love to sell you my book for multiple six figures, but if you find out I’m not who you think I am, don’t think you’re getting your money back because I’ll sue you.”

There really shouldn’t be an issue here, unless… the book proposal doesn’t line up with what the book is now. Back when @gselevator was just @gselevator and not John Lefevre, the potential for a book had a certain mystique. Sure his twitter account was a parody, but his book promised to be true stories. For me, this was a harder sell. Any anonymous person can make up crazy banking stories. Now he gets to tell his story using real names and places, protecting the innocent of course. This should be a layup.

Simon and Schuster made a business decision. It has nothing to do with John Lefevre. If they thought they could sell 100,000 copies of his book, they’d still be buying it. There’s no moral or ethical dilemma here if the book rings true. If it’s as great as he says it is, then he should have no problem finding another publisher. That is, unless he keeps sending out tweets like this: “Stay tuned. Next week, I will tweet locations and times, at various bars in NYC — All drinks will be on Simon & Schuster.”

 
With the help of Millrose Music I was able to finally find a copy of The Good Ship Galleon. With the passing of Shirley Temple I thought it was appropriate. RIP… In October of 2000 we recorded the song with Jesse Jaymes, Lucy Woodward and me – Cleveland D. Not my proudest moment, but whatever – I’d do it again.
 

 
Here is the part of the book that talks about the rap song.
 
One morning, the guy Raj hired to plan the party and arrange for the talent, which included headliner Diana Ross, walks in the door. A hip-looking, tall dude with shaggy blond hair, there’s something about him I like immediately. Maybe it’s his entrepreneurial manner, or that his company seems ultra-creative—along with having him plan the whole party, Raj has also commissioned him to write a rap theme song for Galleon. Or maybe he represents a non-Wall Street part of me I’ve almost completely forgotten. He introduces himself as Jesse Itzler, and then I realize he also goes by the rap name Jesse Jaymes.
“Hey Jesse,” one of my desk mates yells out. “Turney here is a rapper.” I turn a baby girl’s nursery shade of pink. “That so,” he says, nodding his head in approval. “What’s your rap name?”
 
I contemplate choking on a pen cap so I don’t have to tell him. I remember coming home from the beach in 1991 and watching Yo! MTV Raps where he performed “Shake It Like A White Girl” and “College Girls Are Easy.” I knew he’d won an Emmy for “I Love This Game,” a rap song he’d written for the NBA, and he also wrote the New York Knicks theme song, “Go New York, Go New York, Go.”
“Cleveland D,” I say, finally.
“Nice,” he says.
 
Now, calling me a rapper is, to say the least, a bit of a stretch. It’s true I love hip-hop. And it’s also true that in 1988 I formed a rap group called “Maximum Intensity” with my best friend, Nathaniel, who called himself Live T. Most of our other friends hated rap music. But we were in high school in Kennebunk, certainly one of the most un-hip-hop places on earth, and we mostly performed in Nathaniel’s barn to an audience of zero.
 
A couple of days later, the phone rings at the desk and it’s Jesse. He wants to know if I’ll help him with the lyrics for the Galleon theme song. “Really?!” I say, in a voice that is embarrassingly high-pitched. But I follow up with a very manly, “Sure, love to.” After all, though it might be a big jump from Nathaniel’s barn, when will another opportunity like this come along?
 
I meet Jesse at the studio a week before the party. It’s on the Upper West Side in the basement of a building. I’m not sure I’m in the right place until I find the buzzer, above which a small tag reads “Milrose Music.” I walk down the dark rickety staircase. The carpet is dark, the walls are dingy and the whole place smells musty, but the studio looks professional. There’s a couple of recording booths, the engineer’s table in the middle and a couch and chairs in the back. The engineer sees me and says, “Sup?”
 
With only a week to write, record and produce the song, I don’t understand how he’s going to get it done in time. I prepared for our meeting for a week or rather I worried about our meeting for a week. I wanted to prepare, but I didn’t know where to start. I had come up with one idea for the hook, but it seems foolish now. I sit on the couch and Jesse sits on a chair across from me and begins asking me questions about Galleon: what it’s like to work there, what’s Wall Street’s perception of the firm. I tell him one of the names the Street calls Galleon is “the good ship.” And that’s when my one idea pops out of my mouth. Why don’t we sample the song “On the Good Ship Lollipop” but change the lyrics to “On the Good Ship Galleon?” I ask.
His face breaks into a smile. “Cleveland D!” he belts, his head pumping up and down. I breathe a sigh of relief.
 
I start to relax and the lyrics began to flow: It’s the Good Ship Galleon… When Wall Street has a rally on… When Trader’s trade… Everybody in the place gets paid… Shirley Temple would be proud. Jesse has a female vocalist lay down the chorus. Then, with all of my notes and suggestions, he gets into the booth and starts to rap. I’m in awe. In less than twenty minutes he’s done. “Your turn,” he says. Jesse had suggested I rap a few lines or in his words, eight bars. At first I was excited, but now I’m nervous. I think about Nathaniel and all those afternoons and evenings we’d spent practicing, mimicking the latest hit, or coming up with our own rhymes. I need to do this.
 
The engineer plays the track of Jesse’s last line so I’ll know where to jump in. I have to finish his line and rhyme it with CNBC. Here’s what I do: “And me, Cleveland D…,” I begin. “Hit me, bid me, I need liquidity… Stopped me on five? Stupidity… I’m at Galleon where it all connects, trading healthcare and biotech… When I finish, the producer looks at me with an “are you serious?” expression. He plays it back and I sound awful, like a tone-deaf robot. I try it again with little improvement. Nine more times we lay it down. And nine more times the producer shakes his head back-and-forth. Finally, on the eleventh try, he shrugs and my first (and only to this point) rap recording is born. So I don’t sound like Chuck D or Ice Cube or even Vanilla Ice for that matter. I have a CD I can send home to Nathaniel, which he can play as loud as he wants, and silence all the haters in Maine.
 

I don’t know – if you’re coming off of an up 93% year – aren’t you supposed to make a rap song?

I’m heading to London for the U.K. book launch in February.

A trader told me: ‘Nobody gives a shit about your education/GPA/resume. To get a job on Wall St you need to know someone who already works there, and be able to handle numbers’. Is that true?
 
There’s a lot of truth to that statement. And even more so when you get a job. Once you’re in the only thing people care about is the bottom line: Performance. If you didn’t go to a target school getting into Wall Street is like breaking into a house. The front door is locked so you have to try every window and door until you can break in. A young aspiring kid once asked me “what’s the best way to get a trading job at Goldman Sachs?” My reply “Build a time machine and go back and convince your grandfather to work there.”
 
What’s the go-to restaurant/bar for Wall St traders? Bloomberg talks about Smith and Wollensky’s – is that tourist bullshit? Or do the top-earning traders actually hang out there?
 
Not to be rude, but I would rather sit in the bleachers in 100 degree heat at a NY METS game in the 7th inning when they stop selling beer than go to Smith and Wollensky’s. If you’re looking for Wall Street playgrounds that serves food you should go to HARLOW, NOBU 57 or The General.
 
During your time, was there a ‘Dorsia’ equivalent? (You talk about Canal Room in the book… was that the place to be seen, or simply a place you liked?)
 
The Canal Room was a great place to throw a party… But the Dorsia equivalent in my day was Bungalow 8. I guess for a minute it was also Lotus and Marquee.
 
What’s the most extravagant party you threw at The White House?
 
The foot massage party was pretty insane, but I think the most extravagant one was the bring an intern after work party because they had no idea what was behind door #3… Some interns after that became members for life…
 
Is there one Wall St party that has become legendary? (i.e. one that traders acknowledge as the benchmark when it comes to hedonism.)
 
The benchmark for the haves and have not’s is the Super Bowl weekend invite. Typically it’s a private jet with hired help, luxury hotel suites and parties at night. Things can get a little crazy…
 
In terms of pranks between traders, what’s the best one you ever heard about?
 
There’s so many of them, but one of my favorites is when an intern or new employee is asked to find “the upticks” so they are sent by cabs and subways all over Manhattan trying to find them. So the trader on the floor will tell the intern “oh man, they just left but if you go up to XYZ Capital on 57th and Park they should have them… and so on and so on…
 
I feel bad about it now, but I once called a sales trader on their first day and said I needed to buy 1 million shares of T-W-A-T – I spelled out the letters so it didn’t sound like a word. So he stood up on trading floor with all of his new fellow employees and screamed for a market on 1mm T-W-A-T – it took him a few minutes to realize it wasnt a real symbol and it actually spelled a word. I’m going to hell aren’t I?
 
The hazing/initiation ceremonies sound quite tame (getting a junior member of staff to pick up a $5000 tab). Does more extreme stuff go down? Or is it all myth?
 
It’s more about verbal humiliation. Worse stuff probably goes on in fraternity basements all across the country.
 
You indulged in many hedonistic pursuits. Looking back, what’s the dumbest thing you spent money on?
 
I was on a quest to have the most comfortable bed in Manhattan for obvious reasons… I went to ABC Carpet and told the sales woman what I wanted. I really wasn’t impressed, but after prodding a little bit they finally let me into a secret backroom for linens and such. So I brought my items to the register and handed over my credit card. When I saw the total bill was $10,000 for a duvet cover, pillows and sheets I was ill, but it was too late to back out.
 
Wall St has it’s own language (‘fuck-you money’, ‘elephant hunting’) – what was your favourite bit of Wall St slang?
 
My favorite bit about Wall Street language is making fun of it. When guys and girls are so enthralled with their trader talk they start to use it in everyday life… It doesn’t work. Here is an excerpt from my book…
 
He is coming dangerously close to becoming “Johnny Wall Street.” Randy and I have names for guys like this. We just say J Wall for short; he’s the guy who wears button down shirts un-tucked over his khakis. In the office he tells you to protect him on the lunch print as if he was asking to be protected on a block trade of a million shares. Johnny Wall says he’s a size buyer when he sees a hot chick. He tells you at Happy Hour how he whacked a bid and sold another 250,000 shares behind it. At dinner he brings up commissions and research. He asks you what your favorite stock ideas are as you put a slice of buffalo mozzarella in your mouth. He doesn’t own any stocks; he just wants to impress. Johnny is the last one to show up at your high school reunion driving his new car and checking his Rolex. Johnny Wall is a douche.
 
Bizarrely, given the insane amounts of money that traders are responsible for, I’ve heard a lot of them are extremely superstitious. Did you have any superstitions?
 
Superstitious or Super-vicious? No, no superstitions…
 
If there a particular tailor’s shop where you’ll find all the top Wall St guys having their suits made?
 
No not really. Occasionally you’ll see a guy sneak in the side door and take a few quick measurements, but there isn’t a go to place.
 
You were in Wall St around the time of the second dot-com bubble – did the relaxed dot-com vibe change Wall St’s suit-and-tie culture?
 
It changed here and there, but it wasn’t industry wide. You can learn a lot about your peers on casual Fridays… Black jeans and turtlenecks say so much…
 
Privately, did Wall St traders ever say to each other: ‘Yeah, the valuations on these dot-com companies are complete bullshit’?
 
Sure – people said it all the time, but it wasn’t bullshit until they were right. Someone much smarter than me once said… Being early and wrong are the same thing…

Once upon a time there was a bulge bracket firm. The wide open trading floor had rows and rows of desks. Computer screens stacked one on top of the other rose to midair. The seats occupied by mid-life and fledgling Corporate America. Phone cords stretched twenty feet while traders and salesmen spit compliments and hum venom, heels up, jackets off and sleeves rolled up–ready to trade.

Across town I hit my direct wire as the microwave transmission shoots across the copper wires carrying audio and control signals. “Hello,” I hear with a chuckle. My equity sales trader clearly thinks something’s funny. He’s like Chachi from Happy Days, the Scott Baio of Wall Street, a regular heart throb and super proud of his Italian decent. I like Chachi, he’s fun, but I’d have to guess the first thing listed under SKILLS on his resume is: Copy & Pasting Instant Messages. I don’t get much coverage.
“What’s so funny?”
“Nothing,” he says.
“I’ll give you 50,000 shares if you tell me.”
“Throw in 500 contracts and you got yourself a deal,” my derivative sales person says. I didn’t even know she was listening on the line. She’s a tough chick, Wall Street folklore, worked her way up from the mail room. I don’t argue with her much because I never win.
“Fine, 50,000 shares and 500 contracts… Now what’s so funny?”

It turns out that Chachi and Mrs. Folklore keep a running Excel spreadsheet on their computers. Whenever they go to the bathroom they take copious notes. I guess it’s sort of like Santa making a list and checking it twice, he’s going to find out who’s been naughty and who’s washing it right. On one tab of the Excel spreadsheet is the name of the employee and there are two columns: Pee-Pee No Wash and Poo-Poo No Wash. So when they enter the bathroom and see one of their fellow employees accidently forgetting to wash their hands they make a mental note. Then they come back out to the floor and enter it into their system.

But they’re still laughing.
“Keep going,” I say.

Apparently Chachi got cornered at the coffee station with a Managing Director who was on the Pee-Pee No-Wash and the Poo-Poo No-Wash list. Chachi was boxed in, he couldn’t make a move when the right hand reached over and rubbed the top his head like he was an eight year old baseball player. He felt the thumb and forefinger graze his cheek. He almost threw up. So if you are wondering why other employees are avoid shaking your hands, maybe it’s because they’ve seen the Excel spreadsheet.
Other helpful hints for Wall Street bathroom etiquette:
Don’t announce you are looking for the NY POST and then go missing for twenty minutes. It gives us a visual.
If you must talk at the urinal, keep it light and don’t ask me what I think about AAPL’s earnings.
No talking between stalls.
No grunting.
Please flush. Use your shoe like everyone else.
If you don’t flush and there’s no paper in the bowl – it really scares us.
Robbie Stephens Rule – no wiping boogers on the wall especially at eye level.
No cell phones. Do you really need to check your email and make phone calls?
Don’t hang around waiting for someone else to touch the door handle to open it.
No recaps when you get back to the desk.

Airing January 7th on PBS Frontline… I’m very excited to see this film – I did an interview with them for about 90 minutes back in July. Watch the trailer…

To Catch a Trader