Blackstone chief Steve Schwarzman just appeared on CNBC with Maria Bartiromo.

He's in Russia for the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum.

He told Bartiromo that the two main obstacles to investing in Russia are "the rule of law and also, basically, bribery."

He added, however, "the government appears to be making a change."

"The government is quite forthright about encouraging foreign-direct investment, talking about the problems you just mentioned and some others, and talking about aggressively addressing those and changing them," Schwarzman said.

When asked about investment opportunities in Russia, the Blackstone chief highlighted that there are opportunities outside of resources and materials. "Growth is coming from almost everywhere," he said. "They actually have quite a robust consumer economy, so one doesn't have to be in resources and minerals to do well. They've got a fast-growing pharmaceutical industry, for example."

As for Greece and the general climate in Europe right now, Schwarzman said people are "feeling the uncertainty of not only the problems in Greece... in a major way. At the same time, there's almost like a free-floating anger directed at the financial community, which makes decision-making and other things even more difficult."

He added that there seems to be "certain caution and defensiveness and almost a hiatus on certain types of things."

But Blackstone is investing in Europe anyway. The company just bough a company for one billion dollars in Spain.

"One of the things about what we do for a living is when everybody is discouraged and multiples go down, there are usually very good things to buy," he said. "We'll probably be announcing another one within a week in another European country... and we haven't bought companies in Europe for years. So the financial crisis there and the uncertainty leads certain sellers to say I've had enough. If you're buying high-quality companies at what we hope to be, when we look back, reasonable prices, then we should do very well."

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Bank of America is set to foreclose on real estate mogul Kent Swig and his wife because they haven't made any loan payments on their Upper East Side apartment for almost 2 years, the New York Post reports.

The couple are divorcing, but Swig's wife Elizabeth still lives in the Park Avenue co-op, also home to Steve Schwarzman and David Koch.

Swig, who's been battling financial woes since the Lehman Brothers collapse destroyed his portfolio, says his wife is the one that owns the apartment.

The couple "signed documents for a consolidated loan of $4.7 million on their duplex apartment in 2007, but stopped paying by August 2009," the Post said. "Additionally, documents state that by June 2009, the couple ceased making monthly payments of more than $62,000 on a short-term, January 2009 loan for $12.8 million."

The co-op at 71st and Park Ave is famous for its history of blue-blooded residents, including Jackie Onassis and the Blackstone chief. Other Wall Streeters that can be found at 740 Park Avenue include John Thain, Izzy Englander and David Ganek.

Swig is the president of Swig Equities and chairman of HelmsleySpear, real etate investment and development firms.

His soon-to-be ex-wife, Liz, is the daughter of billionaire real estate developer Harry Macklowe.

The couple called it quits last year because of financial problems put a strain on the marriage.

Swig had grown his portfolio to $3 billion, the Post reported last year. "He got in trouble, sources say, when his big lender, Lehman Brothers, went bankrupt." Swig was forced to sell another condo in a fire sale, the Real Deal reported, and was on the verge of filing for bankrupcty.

Don't miss: The 15 Most Expensive NYC Banker Homes >

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Blackstone's Steve Schwarzman, who has decamped to France (for the time being at least) was hanging out in St. Tropez recently.

All was well and fun and he was attending a nice dinner party thrown by businesswoman and international social scenester, Goga Ashkenazi, at her villa, according to the New York Post.

Goga (who is pals with Prince Andrew and gave birth to a baby fathered by Kazakh billionaire Timur Kulibayev, "who controls the country’s oil industry,") first hosted a dinner for 350 people.

But the party really started when another 200 people joined for the after-party, a "topless crasher" basically tackled Grace Jones.

"Grace Jones performed in a black thong when a young woman, who guests described as a "party crasher," jumped onstage and ripped off her top to "grind" with the rock goddess, before the intruder was "escorted out by security," the Post says.

Goga, a financier herself, hangs out with bankers all the time, and they are often guests at her parties. Earlier this year, she "scored another few quick millions by cashing out of the Kazakh gold company she helped launch ahead of its $1.2 billion flotation," the Telegraph reported.

Also in St. Tropez around that time, spotted at well-known restaurant, George Soros.

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

It's been almost a week since Leon Black's 60th birthday party and we're just now getting the details. 

The founder of private equity firm Apollo reportedly threw a blowout birthday bash for 200 guests at his gorgeous oceanfront estate in Southampton, New York last Saturday.

Here are the details. [via DealBook]

• He had his backyard transformed into a "faux nightclub setting" complete with big puffy pillows. 

• Notable guests from Wall Street included Michael Milken, Julian Robertson, Lloyd Blankfein and Steve Schwarzman.  Politicians who made an appearance at the party were Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York.  Martha Stewart and Howard Stern were also present.

• Designer Vera Wang dressed Black's wife for the occasion.

• A buffet dinner was served with crab cakes and steak on the menu.  It even included a seared foie gras food station.

• Elton John gave an hour-and-a-half performance that cost at least $1 million.  He ended the show with "Crocodile Rock."

And we're officially jealous.

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Following Warren Buffett's call for more taxes on the rich, and Obama's recent address on creating jobs, Blackstone CEO Steve Schwarzman has penned his own op-ed in the FT titled: An olive branch to Obama: I will share the pain.

So do you think he's ready to get on the same side as Buffett and endorse higher taxes?

Ha!

First, he blasts the President's rhetoric for creating the current economic weakness:

My concern is compounded because our ability to make economic decisions has become paralyzed by political and social divisions. This problem began when the administration sought to attribute blame for the financial and economic crisis and alienated large segments of the business and banking community. They cast them as villains regardless of their culpability. Predictably, business reacted with fear and limited economic expansion, hiring and new lending. A second response to this was the rise of the Tea Party, which in turn attacked the administration and the Democrats.

Then he pats himself on the back for investing in so many businesses at Blackstone.

And then finally, at the bottom he gets around to his idea of "shared sacrifice" and the emphasis is on shared.

If he's going to be made worse off by higher taxes, then everyone needs to be made worse off, and even there he calls for a flat tax:

“Shared sacrifice” sounds like cheap political rhetoric. But if we are to reform taxes and cut spending sufficiently to make a difference, virtually everyone will be affected. Broad-based tax reform will put everything on the table, from the rates we pay at every bracket to serious thinking about a flat tax regime with few or no deductions. Entitlement reform of Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security will affect the benefits we receive and the amounts we all have to contribute. There will probably not be a single American untouched by the spending cuts needed in the rest of the federal budget.

Good luck.

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Edinburgh-based hedge fund Martin Currie lost more than a third of its assets in the past three months following the departure of fund manager Chris Ruffle to China and as the world's financial markets slumped.

Jamie Dimon was at the Bloomberg offices today. Tons of people wanted to get into the room to speak with him. Only a few people on the financial team did.

Stephen and Leyla Hill, both investors who lost their money to Bernard Madoff's ponzi scheme, are suing JPMorgan Chase for $19 billion, accusing the bank of helping Madoff.

Last Friday, Blackstone Group co-founder Stephen Schwarzman danced the cha-cha-cha with his wife, Christine, who wore a gown by Robert Cavalli, at the Mandarin Oriental for the nonprofit Casita Maria, a center of arts and education for underprivileged youth in the Bronx.

Russell Clark's $143 million Horseman Capital is up 6.89% YTD after crushing it in October with 18.5% gains, thanks to bets on the luxury brands, luxury retailers, luxury autos and Chinese bank sectors. And Michael Hintze's ~$1.3 billion CQS was up 13.8% in October.

Boeing's president and chief financial officer James Bell has been selected to join JPMorgan Chase's board of directors. 

Embattled Bank of America is losing its long-time auditor Paul Morrison who is departing the Charlotte, North Carolina-based bank "to pursue opportunities outside the company."

The Coalition to Save Our GPS wants Phil Falcone's Light Squared barred from using some airwaves for its planned nationwide wireless network because it will interfere with GPS devices. 

Perry Capital's Richard Perry, Avenue Capital's Marc Lasry and Omega Advisor's Leon Cooperman will be in Chicago tomorrow for an investing conference that donates all proceeds to children's charities.

Activist folk-rock group Crosby, Stills & Nash members David Crosby and Graham Nash played a set of acoustic protest-themed songs for the Occupy Wall Streeters camping out the Zuccotti Park in Manhattan's Financial District.

According to a compensation survey, bank bonuses are expected to be 20 to 30% lower this year compared to a year earlier.  That included CEO compensation as well. 

Fox Business's Charlie Gasparino calculates that disgraced MF Global chief Jon Corzine's net worth might be closer to $1 million than $1 billion.

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

UBS is shutting down its asset-backed securities group headed by Ken Cohen, who was hired to lead the group in the Swiss bank's New York offices six months ago.

Goldman Sachs international adviser, Mario Monti, is one of the favorites to succeed Italy's Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. 

Goldman Sachs's head of U.S. loan trading Courtney Mather, who's been with the firm since 1998, left the bank.

Blackstone chief Steve Schwarzman's son Teddy and his film company, Black Bear Pictures, have begun production on "Broken City,” starring Mark Wahlberg, Russell Crowe and Catherine Zeta-Jones.

Ray Dalio's Bridgewater Associates gave a bunch of non-finance major Yale students gourmet popcorn and $100 during a campus recruiting event. 

After celebrity chef Mario Batali compared bankers to Hitler and Stalin on Monday night, Wall Streeters have started boycotting his famed restaurants. 

MF Global's disgraced chief, Jon Corzine, and private equity CEO, Chris Flowers, are not on speaking terms right now. 

CNBC anchor Maria Bartiromo was audibly booed last night during the Republican debate when she asked Herman Cain about his sexual harassment allegations.

Hedge fund manager, Andreas Halvorsen, a former platoon commander for the Norwegian SEAL Team and a Tiger Management alum, is killing it this year with his long/short equities fund, Viking Global Equities, up 9.6% YTD.  However, the main fund is being closed to outside investors. 

Hedge fund industry publication Absolute Return will hold its annual awards ceremony at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in New York tonight.

People might not be jumping into hedge funds, but they're certainly not leaving them in massive quantities.  Hedge fund exits declined to 0.72% in the month ended November 1 compared to 3.25% in the previous month, according to the GlobeOp Capital Movement Index.

The Occupy Wall Streeters in Zuccotti Park have been given their confiscated generators back. 

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Blackstone chairman Stephen Schwarzman is backing Mitt Romney's presidential campaign, Bloomberg is reporting, and will tap his extensive fundraising network for the candidate.

Schwarzman is the latest highest-profile finance executive to jump on board Romney's campaign — holding a fundraising for him at his Park Avenue apartment next month.

While not surprising, Schwarzman's decision to back the former Massachusetts governor this early shows that in the mind of the financial sector, he is the likely nominee.

Read more at Bloomberg >

Please follow Politics on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Blackstone's chief executive Stephen Schwarzman, a big GOP supporter, emphasized his choice to back Republican frontrunner Mitt Romney this week was a personal decision.

"First of all, this is a personal choice and a corporate perspective," he said. 

The private equity tycoon told Bloomberg TV this morning that he became friends with the Republican candidate while working on a two joint deals when Romney was at Bain.

The first deal turned out to generate 16x profit and in the second they made 24x the money, Schwarzman recounted.

While those returns would no doubt make someone friendly in finance, he says he supports Romney for other reasons.

"Mitt is very smart, great in a crisis, direct and can deal with problems as the actually occur," he said, adding, "He's a natural leader and he's accessible."

Schwarzman recently met with Romney, but he wouldn't disclose what he told him.

"What I tell him stays with me, but I'm not shy," he told Bloomberg TV.

He did, however, tell Bloomberg how he feels about taxes.

"I think we have a system where 45% of American's don't pay an income tax.  We have perhaps the most progressive income tax in the world and we have almost half of Americans paying no income tax."

"The concept that half the public isn't involved in the income tax system is somewhat odd.  I'm not saying how much we should do, but I think we should all be part of the system," he added.

Schwarzman, the most recent high-profile Wall Streeter to jump on-board the Romney campaign, will host a fundraising dinner for him at his Park Avenue apartment in two weeks.

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Billionaire private equity tycoon Stephen Schwarzman, the chief executive of Blackstone Group, told Bloomberg Television this morning that he wants more people to pay income taxes. 

"We have a system today in the United States were 45% of Americans don't pay any income tax...You have to have skin in the game," he said.

That essentially means he wants more poor people in the U.S. to pony up and pay income taxes.

However, he didn't specify the amount he wants them to pay. 

"The issue isn't the amount, it's the concept that we are all in this together, solving problems together. I can't micromanage what anybody pays or doesn't pay. But the concept that half of the public isn't involved with the income-tax system is somewhat odd and I'm not saying how much people should do, but we should all be part of the system," he added.

Schwarzman has an estimated net-worth of $4.7 billion, according to Forbes.

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Private equity titan Stephen A. Schwarzman, who co-founded The Blackstone Group and remains its chairman and CEO, relocated to Paris in January of this year. The reasons for the move ranged from increased global opportunity; to the buyers’ market created by sovereign uncertainty; to more proximity to the European continent and Asia.

In actuality, the move was prompted by two things. The first – his involvement with fundraising for the firm’s latest real-estate vehicle. Schwarzman spent 200 of 2010’s 365 days on the road, mostly in Europe and the Middle East.

The second was his wife, people familiar with the matter told CNBC. With so much time on the road, former lawyer Christine Hearst Schwarzman negotiated quite a contract: Six months in the City of Lights, allowing better access to Asia and Europe as a whole—and more face time, these people said. 

Schwarzman’s study abroad came to an end earlier this year around the real estate fund’s first close, which brought in around $4 billion. Total investor commitments are expected to top the previous fund’s $10 billion, according to a person familiar with the matter. A Blackstone spokesperson declined to comment.

Schwarzman would frequently videoconference in to the New York office for meetings and would appear in person about once a month. On the company’s earnings call for the fourth-quarter of 2010, Schwarzman told analysts that taking 2 a.m. calls from NYC wasn’t all joie de vivre: “I think someone’s getting an extra six hours out of me.”

Read more at NetNet >

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

It took four years to do it, but in January, Blackstone plans to close a $16 billion private equity fund, Reuters reports.

The fundraising process for Steve Schwarzman's firm was complicated by the global financial crisis, which battered PE performance and caused institutional investors to be much more reticent in writing huge checks to buyout firms.

And while the fund's size is impressive (it will be the largest private equity fund in the market), it will only be the sixth largest fund to be raised and comes on the back of several years of disappointing fundraising efforts for private equity firms.

Based on that kind of trend line, it's unlikely we'll see a private equity fund this size for a while:

Private equity firms raised $263 billion in 2011, slightly less than in 2010, according to Preqin, and a far cry from the height of the buyouts boom leading up to 2007, when they pulled in around $600 billion a year. 

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Back in 2010, Bank of America registered BrianMoynihanBlows.com and BrianMoynihanSucks.com to play some public relations defense.

Now with all the negative spin surrounding the private equity industry, it looks like Steve Schwarzman's Blackstone Group  has made the same move, Domain Name Wire reports.

The private equity firm just bought 7 variations on the Blackstone Sucks theme. You can't really blame them for wanting to cover all their bases with these:

• blackstonesucks.com
• blackstonegroupsucks.com
• theblackstonegroupsucks.com
• schwarzmansucks.com
• stephenschwarzmansucks.com
• stevenschwarzmansucks.com
• steveschwarzmansucks.com

And here's their registration for steveschwarzmansucks.com:

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

There's this idea that Wall Streeters and officials at Obama's White House are somehow at odds.

But that's mostly just a fantasy, and confined to the world of rhetoric. In fact there's plenty of back and forth, with Wall Street well represented throughout the current administration.

Not only that, the truth is they spend a great deal of time visiting each other, whether it's a hedge funder hosting a campaign fundraiser dinner at a posh Manhattan restaurant or a bank CEO accepting an invite to a State Dinner at the White House.

A handful of Wall Street power players have visited President Barack Obama's White House for dinner parties, receptions and meetings with top officials, according to White House visitors records reviewed by Business Insider.

In 2009, the White House announced -- for the first time in history -- that it would start posting all White House visitors records as part of its new voluntary disclosure policy. So far, 1.9 million records have been made publicly available, but they only go through September 2011, according to the White House.

We decided to comb through the records to pull out some of the biggest names on Wall Street from banks, private equity firms and hedge funds to show how many times they've visited in the past few years and why they were there. [via The Daily]

Lloyd Blankfein (14 Visits)

Goldman Sach's chief executive Lloyd Blankfein has too many White House visits to detail.  Some of his meetings have been with Larry Summers, Valerie Jerrett, Adam Hitchcock and of course Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama. 

* 1/17/2011 -- Blankfein and his wife Laura attended the China State Dinner honoring China's president Hu Jintao, government records show.

* 1/19/2011 -- Blankfein returned to the White House for an 11 a.m. meeting with the President in the Old Executive Office Building, now renamed the Eisenhower Executive Office Building.  The description of the meeting, which had 25 attendees, was "U.S. China Business Leaders," according to White House records.

* 3/18/2011 -- Goldman's CEO met with just Austan Goolsbee in OEOB.  There was no description of the meeting provided.  Blankfein arrived at 4:20 p.m.

* 4/5/2011 -- Blankfein met with William Daley, the now former White House Chief of Staff, at 3 p.m.  There was no description of the meeting provided.

Source: WhiteHouse.gov

Jamie Dimon (13 Visits)

Jamie Dimon, the outspoken chief executive of JPMorgan, has frequented the White House quite a bit.

* 12/14/2009 -- Dimon participated in the bank CEO meeting with Obama in the Roosevelt room.

* 2/23/2010 -- He returned for a dinner party hosted by Obama in the State Dining Room.  Seventeen people were there, according to White House records.

* 5/03/2010 -- JPMorgan's chief executive met with Adam Hitchcock, the now former Chief of Staff of the Council of Economic Advisers, in the West Wing of the White House at 6 p.m. with 13 other people in attendance.

* 1/19/2011 -- Dimon attended the China State Dinner along with 239 other guests in the East Wing of the White House.

Source: WhiteHouse.gov

Brian Moynihan (12 Visits)

Brian Moynihan, the chief executive officer of Bank of America, had a dozen visits to the White House since Obama took office. He's met with leaders such as Larry Summers, Valerie Jarrett, Rahm Emmanuel as well as Obama.  Here are a couple of his meetings at the President's home.

* 7/14/2010 -- Moynihan and other "commercial retrofit leaders" met with Obama in the Roosevelt Room, according to the records.  Key leaders in attendance included President Barack Obama, former President Bill Clinton, and Vice President Joe Biden.  The purpose of hte meeting was to discuss job creation and investment in energy efficiency. (download PDF)

* 9/3/2010 -- Moynihan returned for a private meeting with Summers in the West Wing of the White House. 

Source: WhiteHouse.gov

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Ever since they made 24 times their money investing in Transtar Inc., Steve Schwarzman has had a thing for Mitt Romney.

The Blackstone chief and current private equity titan has endorsed his friend and former private equity compatriot for President and has fundraised for the Romney campaign.

Now Schwarzman has taken a page out of Romney's tax return playbook and is altering the details of a Blackstone investment to avoid releasing personal financial information to the Fed.

Via the WSJ:

Stephen Schwarzman, one of Wall Street's most prominent deal makers, is going out of his way to keep the details of his personal fortune a closely held secret.

Blackstone Group LP is changing the structure of its investment [to less than a 10% stake] in a Florida bank after Mr. Schwarzman, founder and chief executive of the private-equity firm, balked at providing information about his personal finances to the Federal Reserve, according to people familiar with the situation.

It's a bit unclear why Schwarzman is now clamming up when it comes to his wealth.

This is, after all, the man who threw the 60th birthday party to end all parties. His estimated net worth of $4.7 billion has been previously reported. As has his predilection for $400 stone crabs and maniacal attention to his servants uniforms. 

Perhaps he is getting older and wiser?

More likely, Schwarzman has looked at the recent media coverage of private equity and realized that releasing more personal financial information right now would harm his interests and Romney's.  

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Dubai-based billionaire construction magnate Khalaf al Habtoor wants you to know that he had dinner with private equity tycoon Steve Schwarzman last night.

Here's his press release.  (His firm misspelled the Blackstone Group CEO's name.)

Dubai, UAE. 23 February 2012
Khalaf Al Habtoor, the Chairman of the Al Habtoor Group, met with the Steve Scharzman, the Chairman and CEO of the Blackstone Group, on February 21, 2012.

The two men discussed business over dinner at the Habtoor Grand Hotel in Dubai.

Steve Scharzman is a billionaire private equity financer and former investment banker. He co-founded the Blackstone Group in 1985 and was listed amongst Time Magazine's '100 Most Influential People in The World' in 2007.

The Blackstone Group is the world's largest independent alternative asset management company. Based in the US, it offers investment advice and management services at international level. The company's Total Assets under Management were valued at $166.2 billion (Dhs610.48 billion) last year.

"The meeting went very well," commented Al Habtoor afterwards. "Mr Schwarzman is a most interesting man and I think we may well do business together in the future."

We wanted to find out why Schwarzman is visiting Dubai. A spokesperson from Blackstone wasn't immediately available for comment at the time of publication. 

A spokesperson for Habtoor didn't immediately respond to a request for comment either.

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Billionaire private equity tycoon Stephen Schwarzman raked in $148.5 million in pay and cash dividends last year, according to Bloomberg. 

That works out to be just over $406,849 per day (including weekends and holidays).  It also works out to be   slightly more than $16,952 an hour even while he's sleeping!

Bloomberg breaks down his pay here:

The Blackstone co-founder was paid a $350,000 salary and $4.6 million of his share of the firm's profits, known as carried interest, the New York-based company said yesterday in a regulatory filing. He received $74 million in distributions from funds started before the company went public in 2007, and $69.6 million in cash dividends from his ownership of Blackstone stock.

Schwarzman has an estimated net-worth of $4.7 billion, according to Forbes.

SEE ALSO: Billionaire Steve Schwarzman Wishes More Poor People Would Pay Income Taxes >>

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

From today's Politico Morning Money:

Bloomberg’s Hans Nichols scoops: “Tony James, the president of Blackstone Group LP, has agreed to hold a fundraiser for ... Obama’s re-election campaign, according to two people familiar ... By agreeing to raise money for Obama, James has diversified Blackstone’s political bets for the November election. Blackstone Chairman Stephen Schwarzman has been raising money for former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, the likely Republican nominee. The event, originally planned for May 5 at James’ home in Darien, Connecticut, has been rescheduled for later this spring, according to the people, who requested anonymity because the event hasn’t been formally announced.  Peter Rose, a spokesman for Blackstone, declined to comment.”

Read Ben White's Morning Money at Politico.com.

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Bloomberg Businessweek is out with an extensive piece on Wall Street's reaction following the multi-billion dollar trading loss in JPMorgan's chief investment office in London related to derivatives trades. 

The main sentiment is that Wall Street is shrugging off the loss. 

Here's what billionaire private equity tycoon Steve Schwarzman thinks. (emphasis ours)  

“Occasional losses are inevitable,” said Blackstone Group LP (BX) (BX)’s Stephen A. Schwarzman, 65, CEO of the largest private- equity firm. “Publicly excoriating JPMorgan serves no purpose except to reduce people’s confidence in the financial system.”

Huh. 

Read the full report here >

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »

Private equity tycoon Steve Schwarzman said this morning on CNBC's "Squawk Box" that if we keep racking up our deficit "something terrible" will happen.

"If you keep doing this something terrible will happen to the United States.  Something terrible will happen to us," Schwarzman said.

The billionaire private equity exec added that he thinks the U.S. can solve its problems. 

One solution he proposed is that the U.S. will probably need some type of tax reform to deal with the deficit. 

"Today we have half of America not paying income tax. It's sort of, I find that somewhat odd," the Blackstone Group CEO said.  

He explained that there will have to be some "shared sacrifice in the society" to get away from these "enormous deficits."  

He also added that there should be some simplification to the tax system. 

"You need to be a nuclear scientist to fill out a tax form," he said. 

Donald Trump chimed in during the segment that he thinks Schwarzman is "absolutely right." 

Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.

Join the conversation about this story »