Laurence D. Fink
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Laurence D. Fink Fink Mr. Fink
Coming back from vacation, Laurence D. Fink was hit with the news that his division had lost $100 million on a series of risky bets on the volatile mortgage market. Mr. Fink, now chief executive of BlackRock, the rapidly growing asset management company, said that what he learned is that one has to understand ones risk in good times and bad times and that the pain of losing money is far greater than the glory of making money. Twenty years later, almost to the date, Mr. Fink has ascended to a career and personal mountaintop: last week, he clinched an industry-rattling $9.8 billion merger with Merrill Lynch's asset management unit. With BlackRock's stock soaring, he is worth more than $230 million, and, it seemed, just about everyone on Wall Street wanted to take him out to lunch.