The PEUnified Theory of Everything

The Epstein files release brought a banquet of consequences to Brad Karp of legal giant Paul Weiss.  The firm worked with Jeffrey Epstein in conjunction with Apollo Global's private equity business and Apollo co-founder Leon Black, a major funder of Epstein's serial child sex abuse operations.  

Semafor Business Editor Liz Hoffman used the Karp story as a cautionary tale given how private equity consumed the U.S. economy and navigated both political parties to PEs benefit.  She closed her piece with "Even our sexual predators work for private equity."  

PEUReport's mission has been to expose unseen connections and unprincipled business practices of private equity underwriters (PEU), their legendary founders and sponsored politicians of both political stripes.  

The Epstein files are an incredible window into this world, coming at a time when Epstein's longtime wingman is serving his second Presidential term and disintegrating before our very eyes.

Having more is it.  Be it money, power, sex, a higher spot on the billionaire list, the greed and leverage boys want it all and they've coopted government to their mendacious ends.

Politicians Red & Blue love PEU and their newer, brash TechGod brethren.  A shout out to the TechGods for their impatience, on top of Epstein revelations, help pull back the curtain for the public to see.  

Increasingly, more are one:  Politician-PEU-TechGod all rolled into one like JD Vance.

Project Vault: State Capitalism for TechGods

Trump II announced Project Vault, a massive $12 billion public-private partnership around critical minerals.  The Export-Import Bank will provide $10 billion in capital while private companies will add $2 billion.

Vice President J.D. Vance, former TechGod, weighed in (via NYPost):

The strategy proposes a preferential trade zone among allied nations, designed to stabilize prices, block the flood of foreign products and guarantee secure access to essential materials. 

 Vance pitched the Project Vault effort as both an economic and national security mission — and urged allies to join quickly. 

 The objective is “diversifying global supply in the critical minerals market, while strengthening the partner countries who help all of us in this shared effort,” he said.

John Jovanovic, Chairman and President of the Export-Import Bank of the United States, is familiar with levered finance as a former private equity underwriter (PEU) with Cadent Energy Partners and Berenson.  

The bank's news announcement states:

...a Direct Loan of up to $10 billion to Project Vault providing long-term financing to a partnership between original equipment manufacturers and private sector capital providers. 

Initial indications of participation from original equipment manufacturers include Clarios, GE Vernova, Western Digital, Boeing, and many more. 

Suppliers servicing Project Vault include Hartree Partners, Mercuria Americas, and Traxys.

Jovanovic worked for Mercuria from 2016 to 2020 when he received his first Trump I political appointment.  Jovanovic is married to the daughter of Dr. Mehmet Oz, Trump II's Medicare Chief.

Mercuria's press release does not mention Jovanovic's prior employment with the firm.

Just last week Jovanovic spoke before a Baker Hughes annual conference.  He said the bank would determine "which energy projects move forward" and "which partnerships strengthen U.S. interests."  

The bank's programs would "ensure American molecules and technologies reach every corner of the world."  I thought Project Vault's giant subsidies were intended to compete with certain corners of the world in order to supply our domestic needs?

InvestingNews reported:

Helen Amos, a commodities analyst at BMO Capital Markets, said the administration is deploying multiple tools at once. 

“They’re investing directly in equity, they’re building up stockpiles and looking at strategic partnerships with trading companies,” Amos told Bloomberg.   

“They’re coming at it from all possible angles.”

Another take from the same story is below:

Jefferies analyst Charles Boakye put it, Project Vault is “a first big step of many” needed over the next several years. 

“This is not a nationalization of US minerals,” Boakye told Fortune. “It’s state capitalism and it’s industrial policy.”

Like most Trump II initiatives there's a big announcement with many details to be worked out later.  Trump is quick to throw billions at key industries for the benefit of TechGods.  

Politicians Red & Blue love PEU and their new TechGod brethren.  Increasingly, more are one and Uncle Sam's wallet is theirs for the taking.  

“Those are the people that get the special favors.  They get the government contracts, they get the pardons, or somebody they love or one of their friends gets a pardon.”-Marjorie Taylor Greene

Price fixing for TechGods.  They can disrupt markets but heaven forbid markets disrupt them.

TechGods Need Intermediaries to Message the Little People

For decades private equity underwriters (PEU) could not understand why the public was not buying private equity as "mankind's highest calling."  They poured money into campaign after campaign, even changing their trade organization to American Investment Council (AIC) from Private Equity Growth Capital Council (PEGCC).

It appears TechGods have the same struggle and the hottest job in TechLand is storyteller.  

Private equity grew exponentially over the last two decades and many Americans have had experience with their employer becoming a PEU affiliate.   After promises of no change management began importing PEU strategies.  

Adding huge debt and corresponding interest payments required headcount be cut.  The operating model usually involved new tech with varying levels of capability. Employees saw co-workers terminated, communication become top-down only and dealt with new tech, often with little or poor training.  Customer service scores dropped and success was often redefined lower within the new capital structure.  

TechGods played a tangential role in PEUs traumatizing workplaces as they were often behind the incapable technology that was to replace people.  TechGods had their own spheres to lord over, retail, social media, fintech, crypto and now artificial intelligence.  

PEUs early on saw the value of government dalliances.  They built their industry on influencing politicians and tapping Uncle Sam's wallet.  TechGod's are late to this game but bring their "in your face" brashness, a direct contrast to subtle, behind the scenes PEUs.

TechGods need papering over and communication specialists are the ticket.  Just as most people now know Trump II is insane, they know TechGods are not for us.  Look at their history. a story that is already written.  

The future of work is error filled AI as errors are built in and inherent in the models.  You need a PT Barnum level communicator to sell that crap.  

Politicians Red & Blue love PEU and their new TechGod brethren.  Increasingly, more are one.

Update 2-5-26:  What can burst a giant hole in TechGod storytelling?  Factual news.  TechGod Jeff Bezos fired 300 Washington Post employees which some predict will hollow out actual news coverage and stop important investigational work.  Bezos has billions to spend on crappy, hallucinating AI but "no news for you."

Slate reported:

... one of the richest people in human history staged a controlled burn to turn it into ash. Bezos wanted the Post to die, because a vigorous, well-resourced Washington Post does not suit his vision for the world or his own bottom line. The end of the Post is a matter not of journalistic economics but of Bezos’ incentives. 

Bezos’ external economic interests turned him into a virus that ate the Post from the inside.

TechGods have stories to spin and don't need any stinkin' reporters to counter their fictional narratives, just like their Executive Branch patron (Trump II) who lives in a world that makes infrequent contact with most people's reality.  Can you employees smile while being fired?  

WaPo workers, please consider buying from Bezos new lingerie line with Sydney Sweeney with your severance check.  

TechGods in Epstein Library

Microsoft founder Bill Gates was the top male TechGod in search results from the just released Epstein Library.  Google founder Eric Schmidt came in between Jeff Bezos and Marc Andreessen.  Specific numbers can be seen in the graphic above.

Epstein worked hard to get Schmidt to a dinner in 2013, dropping names like Woody Allen & Soon Yi, as well as Ehud Barak and Peter Mandelson.  

A March 2012 e-mail from redacted had a number of TechGods on an invite list for two seminars, one on money and another on power.  

The top female, TechGoddess Nicole Junkermann, came in at 3.482 results.  Junkermann spanked all the Boy TechGods.

Politicians Red & Blue love PEU (private equity underwriters) and their new TechGod brethren and increasingly, more are one.  

Epstein's Junkermann PEU

The Epstein Library has curious functionality.  Yesterday I could search the last name Junkermann and see 4,000 results.  Today it shows zero.  

A search on that person's first name, Nicole, produced over 5,000 results.  I'll venture most belong to Junkermann but there is another Nicole that works for Deutsche Bank.  

Nicole Junkermann founded NJF Capital which invests in various transformative tech ventures.  It also has a sister firm, NJF Private Equity.  That makes her a private equity underwriter (PEU).  There aren't many who can pull off a TechGod/PEU combo.

In January 2014 TechGoddess Nicole Junkermann informed Jeffrey Epstein that she had "split up with mario."  

Junkermann experienced the creep in Jeffrey Epstein.  He lorded over her as ungrateful and ungiving, but she gave it right back.

Jeffrey and his wingman, Donald, missed the part about insiders not speaking badly about other insiders.  Either would trash you in a heartbeat.  

The DOJ's Epstein Library is another window into politicians Red & Blue love PEU and their new TechGod brethren where increasingly, more are one.

Epstein Core Part of Insider Club

The Harvard Crimson wrote in 2003 regarding Jeffrey Epstein:

Lindsley Professor of Psychology Stephen M. Kosslyn, former Dean of the Faculty Henry A. Rosovsky and Frankfurter Professor of Law Alan M. Dershowitz are among Epstein’s bevy of eminent friends that includes princes, presidents and Nobel Prize winners.

Epstein is also well acquainted with University President Lawrence H. Summers. The two serve together on the Trilateral Commission and the Council on Foreign Relations, two elite international relations organizations.

Larry Summers informed one U.S. Senator in 2014:

I had a choice. I could be an insider or I could be an outsider. Outsiders can say whatever they want. But people on the inside don’t listen to them. Insiders, however, get lots of access and a chance to push their ideas. People — powerful people — listen to what they have to say. But insiders also understand one unbreakable rule: They don’t criticize other insiders. 

Searching the Epstein files for private equity underwriters (PEU) I came across a 2015 e-mail from Anthony Scaramucci to Epstein regarding a club settlement.  

Yes, in the good company of PEU insiders.  

Searches of the just released Epstein files show:

Apollo Global - 8,259 results

Blackstone Group - 117 results

Carlyle Group - 168 results

KKR - 364 results

Politicians Red & Blue love PEU and their new TechGod brethren.  Increasingly, more are one.

And the whole thing smells just rotten to the core, especially as victim's lawyers are:.  

contending widespread failures by the DOJ to redact names and identifying information of Epstein’s victims

Victims are not insiders and thus, not listened to.

Update 2-5-26:  Semafor reported the PEU connection regarding Paul Weiss (lawyer) and Jeffrey Epstein:

The downfall of the most powerful managing partner at one of the world’s most powerful law firms isn’t really a story about Jeffrey Epstein. Chummy emails with the wealthy sex offender were the proximate cause of Brad Karp losing his seat atop Paul Weiss, but the distal cause is a problem we’ve all got: overexposure to private equity. 

Even our sexual predators work for private equity now.

PEUReport noted Epstein's link to private equity legends as well as the difficulty of unwinding Epstein's PEU money and influence trail.  I wrote the following in July 2019:

"The other interesting element is PEU ties to serial sex abuser Jeffrey Epstein.  

One Wall Street source with direct knowledge of Epstein’s business said one source of Epstein’s income was providing “tax advice and estate planning” to rich clients, like Apollo Global Management founder Leon Black, presumably because Epstein had experience with offshore funds after basing his office in the Virgin Islands. In 2015 Black made a $10 million donation to Epstein’s foundation. 

Esptein's case reveals the sordid underbelly of big money-politics.  Big PEU names have to be nervous about their Epstein ties, Leon Black, Tony Blair and Bill Clinton (whose presidency saw the rise of many private equity firms).. 

Unraveling stories takes time and patience and the Epstein case is monstrous.  The PEU boys can spin better than most.  For the last twelve years I've tried to unwind some of them." 

Epstein Files: KKR Mentions

The 3.5 million document release of the Epstein files contains numerous private equity underwriter (PEU) references.  This post includes a number related to KKR.  Above you can see a Kevin Law offering to put Epstein's buddy Prince Andrew into a KKR syndicate.

A David Stern contacted Epstein regarding KKR's "interest in the business."  Stern offered to be "on P alert" for Jeffrey.

Richard Kahn contacted Epstein to inform him of Trump I's catering to the PEU class, including KKR.

Kahn reached out to Epstein regarding a possible investment relative to a former KKR partner.

TechGoddess Nicole Junkermann contacted Epstein in regard to KKR.

Epstein and contacts accessed shareholder information from KKR.

Kevin Law referenced KKR again and their pushiness:

Deutsche needed Epstein information for their KYC efforts for Southern Trust Company, Inc.:

Southern Trust Company "provided cutting edge consulting services" in the area of "biomedical and financial informatics."  Epstein's Pedo Island business received an economic development subsidy:

“a 10-year package of economic incentives running from Feb. 1, 2013, until Jan. 31, 2023, that included a 90% exemption from income taxes and 100% exemptions from gross receipts, excise, and withholding taxes in the Virgin Islands.”

The PEU boys hate paying taxes.  

Over a four year period  "Epstein’s income tax exemption was $71.3 million.”

It's no surprise that Jeffrey Epstein ran with the greed and leverage boys given his political connections and the fact that Apollo co-founder Leon Black (likely the LB mentioned in an e-mail above) funded Epstein's lifestyle.  

Epstein owned 50% of American Yacht Harbor in Red Hook where Southern Trust Co. has its office. The marina is still receiving EDC tax breaks.

Looking through the PEU window for the last few decades has been disturbing enough.  Adding the Epstein spyglass further sickens me.  

Politicians Red & Blue love PEU and their new TechGod brethren.  Increasingly, more are one.