WOW! Billionaire Hedge Fund Tycoon John Paulson Donates US$100 Million for Central Park

My Comments:   I'm very impressed with this act! This guy is also a financial genius, a self-made businessman, a philanthropist from the Jewish minority, he's a business and civic leader.

Billionaire Paulson Donates $100 Million for Central Park

By Henry Goldman - Oct 23, 2012 10:53 PM GMT+0800 Bloomberg

Billionaire John Paulson and the Paulson Family Foundation are donating $100 million to the Central Park Conservancy, the largest parks donation ever.

Paulson, 56, is founder of Paulson & Co., a New York-based hedge fund that manages $21 billion across 10 funds. Paulson was worth $11.8 billion yesterday, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. His contribution will help renovate and maintain park facilities and pay for recreation programs, said Doug Blonsky, president of the conservancy, which is responsible for its maintenance and operations. Half will bolster the park’s endowment, which now stands at $144 million, Blonsky said.

Billionaire Paulson Donates $100 Million for NYC’s Central Park

Rick Maiman/Bloomberg

John A. Paulson, president of Paulson & Co.

Oct. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Billionaire John Paulson and the Paulson Family Foundation are donating $100 million to the Central Park Conservancy, according to a news release today. (Source: Bloomberg)

Keyur Khamar/Bloomberg

Residential buildings line Central Park in this aerial photo taken over New York.

“The Conservancy is responsible for transforming and sustaining Central Park as the celebration of culture, nature and democracy that it is today,” Paulson said in a statement. “It is my hope that today’s contribution will help it endure and flourish.”

The park’s 843 acres (341 hectares) stretch from 59th Street to 110th Street in Manhattan and make up a leafy oasis on an island of concrete. Conservancy crews care for 250 acres of lawns, 24,000 trees, 150 acres of lakes and streams and 130 acres of woodlands, according to its website.

“Central Park is a paradise unlike anywhere else in the world today,” said Paulson, whose Fifth Avenue apartment faces the park’s east side and overlooks its reservoir. “I wanted the amount to make a difference.”

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Paulson was raised in the middle-class Beechhurst section of Bayside, in New York’s Queens borough. As a child, his parents took him through the park in a stroller, he said. He was valedictorian at New York University and attended Harvard Business School.

After working in risk arbitrage at Bear Stearns Cos., Odyssey Partners and Gruss Partners, Paulson founded Paulson & Co. in 1994, with $2 million from friends and family.

Paulson in 2009 donated $20 million to New York University Stern School of Business and the following year, along with his wife, Jenny, donated $5 million to Southampton Hospital in New York, which named an emergency department after them.

Paulson also donated $15 million to a children’s and maternity hospital in Guayaquil, Ecuador, according to a Nov. 21, 2010 statement.

The nonprofit Central Park Conservancy was founded in 1980, according to its website. Its mission was to restore America’s foremost urban public space to the condition envisioned by its 19th-century designers, Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux. In 1998, the Conservancy and the city of New York signed a management agreement formalizing their then 18-year public- private partnership.

“Central Park has an enormous economic impact on our city -- 40 million annual visitors generating $1 billion in economic activity -- and that’s in large part due to the great work of the Central Park Conservancy, the Parks Department and the New York City Police Department, who have worked together since 1980 to restore Central Park to its glory and take it to new heights,'' Mayor Michael Bloomberg said in a prepared statement. The mayor is founder and majority of Bloomberg News parent Bloomberg LP.

Bill Gates' amazing Windows 8, vast wealth, charities and his dream homes Will Soon Flourish column by Wilson Lee Flores The Philippine Star September 9, 2012

As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.     — Bill Gates




SINGAPORE — During a recent trip to ASEAN’s financial and technology hub, top Microsoft officials showed me sleek mobile phones and laptops made by HTC, Samsung, Nokia, Lenovo and Acer which respectively run on Windows 7.7 and 7.1 software.

A Microsoft executive told the Philippine STAR: “Windows 7.5 offers hundreds of features and experiences designed to build on phones’ intuitive, ‘people-first’ foundation — multitasking, more integrated apps, primo mobile Web browsing and powerful/personalized tools like integrated social networking and conversation threads for connecting with people in our lives.”

What is even more exciting is the scheduled global launch of Windows 8 in late October, which incidentally coincides with the 57th birthday of Microsoft founder Bill Gates.



More than all the impressive technological advancements which are expected to improve our lifestyles, I decided to do additional research on Bill Gates. Here are some of the many reasons why we should admire this extraordinary visionary:

Continuous innovation is key to real success. Bill Gates has shown that innovating is essential not only to business, but also to professional and other successes. The popularity of computers and Microsoft’s Windows software in virtually every household or business on earth became a reality due to Bill Gates’ nonstop quest for technological innovations.



Nowadays, Bill and wife Melinda use nonstop innovations in their passionate and diverse philanthropic endeavours in Third World nations. Bill Gates said: “Never before in history has innovation offered the promise of so much to so many in so short a time.”




Bill Gates, a self-made man, is the world’s second wealthiest. Once the world’s wealthiest tycoon for 13 years, Gates established Microsoft as the world’s technological trendsetter.

At the start of September, his estimated personal fortune was US$72.89 billion based on Microsoft stock price of $30.82 per share. Unknown to most people, his three kids like to tease Bill Gates by singing the song Billionaire by Travie McCoy and Bruno Mars.




Gates advocates not giving too much in inheritance. Last year, Bill Gates made global headlines by saying that his three children---16-year-old Jennifer, 13-year-old Rory and 10-year-old Phoebe---would only inherit "a miniscule portion" of his wealth.

He added: “It will mean they will have to find their own way.” Various media reports added that each child would receive possibly less than $10 million each. Of course, he will give his kids “an unbelievable education” plus health benefits.



This writer admires the bold unconventional thinking of Bill Gates and his friend, the world’s third wealthiest tycoon Warren Buffett, of not bequeathing too much wealth to kids or kin. I believe that not giving too much wealth can help build the character of people. By allowing kids and kin to find their own way, we allow them the struggle to amass one’s own money which is one of the world’s incomparably great thrills!

(Photo below of Bill Gates with his friend world's third wealthiest billionaire, during the launch of a Chinese-manufactured car)



(Again, picture of the two friends)



Bill Gates seems to have another thought-provoking reason for not wanting to bequeath wealth to kids. He said last year that self-made millionaires and billionaires tend to donate so much more money to charities which help the world, compared to generally less-generous heirs. He said in March 2011: “Our experience worldwide is that first-generation wealth is actually more generous than dynastic wealth.”

Losing world’s richest crown, Bill Gates is still the most generous philanthropist. The Microsoft founder actually didn’t lose his title as the world’s richest man in 2010 to Mexico’s telecom monopolist Carlos Slim due to lack of business acumen or a slack in Microsoft’s success. Bill Gates gave away that title by donating a huge chunk of his wealth — worth billions of dollars — to his charitable organization called the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

(Below is photo of world's No. 1 richest billionaire Carlos Slim of Mexico, as photographed by Adriana Zehbrauskas of the New York Times)



This foundation helps educational and public health causes all over the world. He has studied the charitable works of past American self-made tycoons Andrew Carnegie (who donated most of his wealth) and John D. Rockefeller. I believe Bill Gates now has a greater distinction in being the world’s No. 1 most generous philanthropist; in fact, he has already donated $28 billion.

(Photos of phenomenal American "rags-to-riches" tycoons Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockfeller, whose magnanimous philanthropies Bill Gates studied)








Melinda French Gates has encouraged the public to learn from the philanthropic efforts of the Salwen family, who sold their house in order to donate half its value. This story is recounted in the 2010 book by Kevin Salwen and his 14-year-old daughter Hannah entitled The Power of Half: One Family’s Decision to Stop Taking and Start Giving Back.

Bill and Melinda Gates invited Joan Salwen to Seattle to speak about their family’s social idealism. Then, on Dec. 9, 2010, Gates, his friends Warren Buffett and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg signed a promise called the “Gates-Buffet Giving Pledge”: a pledge to eventually donate to charity at least half of their wealth.

(Pictures below of the Salwen family, the house they sold in order to donate half their money to charity, and the popular book)









Bill Gates is a good family man with a dream house by the lake. For his family, Bill Gates took seven years to build a high-tech, Pacific Northwest lodge design house with total floor area of 66,000 square feet over five acres of land by the lake. Much of this mansion is underground, so it doesn’t look humongous. This house is auspicious based on ancient Chinese feng shui or geomancy — located by a hill and overlooking a lake.

Nicknamed Xanadu 2.0, this wonderful home has the following areas: seven bedrooms, 24 bathrooms, six kitchens, six fireplaces, a pool building, exercise facilities, a 2,100-square-foot domed library including two secret bookcases (Gates has loved to read ever since he was a kid), an art collection, a formal dining room, a trampoline room, offices, a reception hall, a multi-purpose room, guest house, underground garage and two above-ground garages, a theater that seats 20 people, gatehouse, boathouse, activities building, estuary, 60-foot swimming pool with underwater music system, a reception hall that can accommodate 150 people for a sitdown dinner or 200 people for a cocktail party, gardens, and a stocked trout stream.

(The residence or mansion of Bill Gates and his family)



(Another view of the Bill Gates mansion)



(A picture of the unique and extraordinary Bill Gates mansion)




(U.S. News & World Report rendition of Bill Gates' high-tech mansion)




Bill Gates once said about his parents’ marriage: “In my parents I saw a model where they were really always communicating, doing things together. They were really kind of a team. I wanted some of that magic myself.”

A bridge player, golfer and fan of Frank Sinatra songs, Bill Gates is a loving husband and has raised his three kids to lead healthy, normal lives. Beyond his being the Genghis Khan of technological conquests, his vast wealth or his philanthropic largesse, this writer also admires tech whiz Bill Gates for his success as a good husband and a good father.

(Singer Frank Sinatra, Bill Gates admires his songs)

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