Leon Black leaving helm of Apollo amid Jeffrey Epstein controversy
By: Josh K.
Billionaire Leon Black is leaving Apollo Global Management in a surprise announcement as controversy continues to swirl around his ties to pedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein.
The giant buyout firm said on Monday that Black is giving up the chairman’s role that he had vowed to keep in January after the firm reviewed his relationship with Epstein. Black also will step down as chief executive immediately after previously saying he would step down before July 31.
Black, 69, cited his and his wife’s ailing health and Apollo’s strong financial footing as he reversed course.
A monthslong investigation conducted by law firm Dechert found no evidence that Black engaged in any of Epstein’s alleged criminal activities but determined that he paid Epstein $158 million for advice on taxes and estate planning — a far larger figure than had been previously known.
The payments were mostly for work done after 2008, when Epstein pleaded guilty and was convicted in Florida for procuring an underage girl for prostitution.
“The relentless public attention and media scrutiny concerning my relationship with Jeffrey Epstein — even though the exhaustive Dechert Report concluded there was no evidence of wrongdoing on my part — have taken a toll on my health and have caused me to wish to take some time away from the public spotlight that comes with my daily involvement with this great public company,” Black wrote in a letter to Apollo’s board.
Debra Black was diagnosed with stage two melanoma more than a decade ago, and she and her husband have given hundreds of millions of dollars to fund research into the disease through a foundation they established in 2007. She has continued to struggle with the disease in recent months, a source told.
Black, meanwhile, has been battling his own health issues for the past several weeks, the source said.
Black is leaving the company and its board entirely, and will be replaced as chairman by former Securities and Exchange Commission boss Jay Clayton, who just joined Apollo’s board as lead independent director last month.
Apollo also said Monday that co-founder Marc Rowan — who had left the firm last year — has formally taken over as CEO. Josh Harris, who co-founded Apollo in 1990 with Black and Rowan and until recently had been running the firm day-to-day, remains at the firm with a seat on its board, according to a source.
Apollo announced the succession plan in January following an internal probe of Black’s relationship with Epstein, who died in jail in August 2019 while facing federal sex-trafficking charges.
In a statement, Black said Apollo expected its first-quarter earnings to beat Wall Street’s expectations and that this year’s fundraising was set to come in at the high end of a forecast of $15 billion to $20 billion.
The firm added two more directors to its board, naming Richard Emerson, president of Pendral Capital, and Kerry Murphy Healey, president of the Milken Center for Advancing the American Dream, effective immediately.
Black, along with Rowan and Josh Harris, founded Apollo in 1990 from the ruins of Michael Milken’s Drexel Burnham Lambert, building it into one of the biggest private equity funds with $455 billion under management.
“Marc has seamlessly transitioned into the CEO role and I am confident Apollo will soar to new heights under his leadership. He will be in great company alongside seasoned leaders Jim Zelter and Scott Kleinman,” Black said in a statement.
The statement looked like a thinly veiled swipe at 55-year-old Harris, who reportedly had sought Black’s ouster in January following the Dechert report, according to sources.
Meanwhile, Black is presently negotiating with the Museum of Modern Art on how to leave his term as chairman at the museum which is slated to end July 1, sources said.
