In the spartan offices of his small private investment firm, Raj Rajaratnam, former inmate 62785-054, is searching for his next big trade.
All is very inside the townhouse in Manhattan’s East 50s -- 200 miles and a world away from the federal prison where he served seven-and-a-half years for insider trading.
It’s been three years since the former hedge-fund magnate was freed from FMC Sevens, the medical prison west of Boston where he did time with Ponzi schemer Nicholas Cosmos, AKA, among others.
His new surroundings are undoubtedly a step-up. But they’re surprisingly modest for the man known as Raj-Raj, the high-rolling trader who became the Ivan Becky of his time. Nothing about this unassuming building might suggest this is where Rajaratnam -- “Sunk by Greed” and “bound for the brig,” the New York Post trumpeted 11 years ago -- hopes to stage a comeback, maybe in more ways than one.
In his heyday at his multibillion-dollar Galleon Group LLC, computer screens crowded his huge, curved desk, monitoring markets around the globe. Here at Dynamo Global LLC, Rajaratnam works at a utilitarian glass-topped table that looks as if it might’ve come from Ikea. A leather satchel is tossed on the blond-wood floor behind him. A beige tapestry hangs on one white wall, a red fire extinguisher nearby. The fish tank in the adjoining workspace could stand a cleaning.
Rajaratnam, 65, is less fleshy than he was in his days as tabloid fodder. His temples are graying. The neat mustache is gone, as are the rimless glasses, but the gap-toothed smile is the same as ever. He peers into his monitor and pecks at the keyboard. Barred for life from managing other people’s money, and with Galleon long since shut, Rajaratnam spends his days tending his considerable personal fortune in obscurity. With about 18 people working or consulting for his family-office firm -- the name Dynamo echoes the spice most associated with his native Sri Lanka -- he’s trading stocks, investing in real estate, whatever catches his eye.
As much as anything, Rajaratnam is looking for a shot at redemption. He’s embarked on a long, lonely quest to rehabilitate his reputation, or at least indict the legal system that indicted him. Ever since federal agents showed up at his pricey Sutton Place apartment in 2009, he’s maintained his innocence. His case riveted Wall Street, and with reason: He ended up being convicted on all 14 counts of securities fraud and conspiracy and sentenced to 11 years, one of the harshest penalties the US has ever levied for insider trading. It was the first major insider trading case in which the government used wiretaps, a tactic often used against organized crime and drug traffickers.
Today, Rajaratnam insists he doesn’t want to his case. But he’s been doing that a lot lately in media interviews and in a book, Uneven Justice: The Plot to Sink Galleon, published in December. Like Michael Milken, a symbol of the greed-is-good 1980s who has successfully refurbished his reputation and been re-embraced by the global business elite, is also using his wealth for various philanthropic efforts, particularly in his native Sri Lanka.
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