Associated Press-Democrat John Edwards said Tuesday that he worked for a hedge fund between presidential campaigns to learn about financial markets and their relationship to poverty – and to makemoney too.
In an interview with The Associated Press, the former North Carolina senator said his yearlong, part-time position with Fortress Investment Group helped his understanding of the connection but he has more to learn. Edwards has made eradicating poverty a focus of his second White House bid.
Edwards, a multimillionaire after years as a trial lawyer, would not disclose how much he got paid for a year of consulting beginning in October 2005. He said the amount will be revealed when he releases his financial disclosure forms due May 15.
Asked if he had to join a hedge fund to learn about financial markets, Edwards replied, “How else would I have done it?”
He said he considered going to an investment firm such as Goldman Sachs, but Fortress was the most natural fit. Presented with the suggestion that he could have taken a university class instead, he said, “That’s true.”
“It was primarily to learn, but making money was a good thing, too,” the 2004 vice presidential nominee said in an hourlong interview with AP reporters and editors.
Hedge funds, now numbering more than 9,000 in the U.S. with assets estimated to exceed $1 trillion, traditionally cater to the rich, as well as pension funds and university endowments, but are increasingly luring less wealthy investors.
