Hedge Fund Billionaire Still Battles with Ex-wife 20 Years After Divorce
Steven A. Cohen has made billions of dollars as a hedge fund manager in the course of his career, making him one of the richest men in the world. But even a top-notch power broker like Cohen can find himself caught up in a divorce that continues to cause turmoil even 20 years down the road.
New York Magazine had a recent article describing how, 20 years ago, Cohen, the overseer of a $13 billion financial enterprise SAC Capital Advisors, was embroiled in a nasty divorce with his ex-wife, Patricia.
Even two decades since, there are lawsuits and accusations, including allegations of hidden funds and insider trading totaling in the millions.
But it wasn’t always that way.
Steven and Patricia were married in the early 80s after a six-month whirlwind romance that began when she ducked into a barroom on a rainy evening to dry out a white camisole. Soon they had their first of two children.
Even two decades after their divorce, their relationship has not yet ended, though one wouldn’t imagine it has turned out the way that they hoped it might when they first met in that bar on the Upper East Side. Now, Patricia is accusing her ex-husband of being a bully. “I’ve been punished for 20 years,” she told New York Magazine.
Patricia has filed a lawsuit against Steven, seeking a catharsis of her own, claiming that he hid millions of dollars from her in the 1980s. The complaint also asserts that he used a New York real estate operator to funnel the money away from the insider trading used to acquire it. That operator was later convicted of fraud.
Steven Cohen has denied the charges.
In a strange twist to the story, Patricia’s first lawyer had filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit a week after it was filed. Patricia fired this lawyer and hired another to pursue her sustained belief that Steven concealed money from her.
Steven Cohen was a big-time broker in a cutthroat business in the early days of their marriage. He worked late and got stressed out, which led to mood swings and tension in the household that the couple made together. She lectured him on his moods, and he resented her lack of appreciation for his drive to support the family, which he called “going to war.”
In the end, she hadn’t identified his drive to succeed at the money game. “Maybe I mistook his youth for idealism,” she said.
In the late 80s they divorced. Despite anger and resentment, arguments and even a physical altercation, the two were entwined, and had trouble disentangling from each other. They continued to talk on the phone for hours, even as their marriage fell apart.
When the divorce finally went through, Steve gave Patricia $1 million and their apartment on the East End. His stated worth at the time was $16.9 million, though he wrote off $8.75 million of that as a bad real estate investment. Based on that write-off, he judged that Patricia got about half of their worth. This last deal, however, is one that Patricia is now contending.
At the time of the divorce, Steve paid around $3,000 per month in child support, as well as for camp and other children’s activities. Compared to his income, however, the payout was minimal. Patricia, for her part, only a year after the divorce, ran out of money.
Typical arguments ensued as he criticized her money management and she called into question his parenting. Steve would increase his child support payments, but didn’t feel Patricia was appreciative.
“She’s a terrorist,” Steve told a friend of his about her current activities. “On a mission to make my life a living hell.”
Such a story, while atypical in the sums of money involve, proves yet again that financial power and celebrity does not render one immune to the traumatic and emotional world of divorce.
