Alan C. "Ace" Greenberg (born September 3, 1927) is a former Chairman of the Executive Committee of The Bear Stearns Companies, Inc.
He began work at Bear Stearns in 1949 as a clerk. He served as Chairman of the Board of Bear Stearns from 1985 to 2001, and as its CEO from 1978 to 1993. Greenberg serves also as a non-executive director of Viacom. He is the author of Memos from the Chairman, which is a compilation of memos he issued to the associates of Bear Stearns during his tenure as CEO.
While serving as Chairman of the Executive Committee of Bear Stearns, Greenberg saw the collapse of the company in March 2008. He was subsequently involved in the talks with JPMorgan Chase, which bought out the failing company.[1] Fortune reported that Greenberg agreed to join JPMC as vice chairman of Bear’s retail business.[2]
Greenberg is an avid bridge player, having won the Reisinger Board-a-Match Teams in 1977. In 1981, he won the Maccabiah Games teams bridge tournament[3] and was second in the Reisinger later that year.
In 1969, while a bridge neophyte, Greenberg hired fellow player James Cayne as a stockbroker at Bear Stearns. By 1993, Cayne was CEO of Bear Stearns, a position he held until the firm's demise in 2008.
Greenberg is also a member of the Society of American Magicians. In 1998, Greenberg was the subject of a 999-word profile in People Magazine that trumpeted his $1 million donation to New York City's Hospital for Special Surgery to underwrite Viagra prescriptions for financially needy, impotent men.
"You do some nutty things," Greenberg stated and he told People that his wife Kathryn told him, "you've made your money, and you can spend it any way you want." That philanthropic gesture topped the time Greenberg paid to repair the bathrooms at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem.[4]
Alan Greenberg is married to Kathy Greenberg, who is the Board Chair of Cardozo School of Law and the founder of the New York Legal Assistance Group.
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