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Obama’s ‘Money Guy’

Corzine raises at least a half-mil for Obama

February 1, 2012

Apparently, former MF Global CEO Jon Corzine is a lot better at raising money for politicians than he is at investing it on behalf of his clients.

Corzine, who President Obama dubbed his "Wall Street guy," and was thought to have been a top candidate to replace Timothy Geithner as Treasury Secretary, recently told Congressional investigators that he  "simply (doesn’t) know" what happened to nearly $1.2 billion in MF Global customer funds that went missing under his watch. But the former New Jersey governor has proved far more competent at bundling campaign donations for Obama.

The Weekly Standard reports:

According the Barack Obama's 2012 campaign website, Jon Corzine of Hoboken, New Jersey raised at least $500,000 for the president's reelection effort.

Corzine, of course, has most recently been in the news for being on the wrong side of a $6.3 billion bet as head of MF Global. "MF Global filed for bankruptcy on October 31, after $6.3 billion in risky bets on European sovereign debt spooked investors and an effort to sell the company failed," Reuters reported. "Investigators are searching for as much as $1.2 billion in missing customer money, which regulators said the company may have diverted for its own needs."

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Corzine's fundraising puts the former Goldman Sachs CEO and disgraced banker in the highest category of bundlers in terms of dollars raised. But he most likely won't be a resident of Hoboken for much longer. "The scandal-hit former MF Global chief has put his penthouse condo along the Hudson on the block for $2.9 million," the New York Post reported today. "That’s a 12 percent drop compared to the $3.3 million he paid for his high-end Hoboken bachelor pad just three years earlier."

The House Financial Services Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations will convene its second hearing into on the MF Global debacle on Thursday, Feb. 2.