U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick sold his stakes in the Wall Street business group he ran for more than three decades, passing ownership to his children and private outside investors and cashing out at least hundreds of millions of dollars.
Lutnick's ownership of brokerage and investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald LP has been transferred to trusts for the benefit of his children, including Brandon and Kyle, his two oldest sons, who were appointed earlier this year to oversee the group, according to a statement Monday. Terms weren't disclosed.
A minority investment also came from an investor group led by 26North Partners, founded in 2022 by Josh Harris, co-founder of Apollo Global Management Inc. The group also includes Glenn August, the founder of private-credit investor Oak Hill Advisors.
"Kyle and I are honored to continue building on our father's legacy, leading Cantor Fitzgerald alongside the exceptional executive team we have in place today," Chief Executive Officer Brandon Lutnick said in the statement.
Howard Lutnick, 63, who was CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald until he joined President Donald Trump's Cabinet in February, confirmed in January that he would divest his interests in the three core firms that constitute his business group: investment bank Cantor, brokerage BGC Group Inc. and property firm Newmark Group Inc.
He now holds one of the most prominent roles in the U.S. cabinet, in charge of a key department responsible for Trump's sweeping tariff policies.
As part of the divestment, the billionaire sold his beneficial stakes back to his public companies, which remain controlled by private parent firm Cantor Fitzgerald. Newmark bought his shares for $127 million, while BGC paid $151.5 million, the companies said in separate statements.
Lutnick won't have to pay capital gains taxes on the sales as long as he puts the proceeds into Treasuries or a broadly based mutual fund -- assets that don't pose a conflict of interest.
Documents released by the U.S. Office of Government Ethics in January also showed he had roles in at least 800 legal entities. In his ethics agreement, Lutnick said that, in line with U.S. law, he'd divest a swath of business stakes that count as interests to him, his wife or his "minor children" within 90 days of his confirmation.
"Upon my confirmation, my businesses will be for sale, and someone else will lead them going forward," Lutnick said in a hearing before senators in January.
His firms are now primed to take advantage of a boom in digital assets and are hiring investment bankers with the promise of large pay packets, executives said in a March interview. Cantor, which Bloomberg reported is in talks to acquire hedge fund O'Connor from UBS Group AG, also recently started a crypto firm with Tether Holdings SA and SoftBank Group.
In February, Lutnick named named his two oldest sons and three company deputies to run the core of his business group after his Senate confirmation and resignation from Cantor Fitzgerald.
He tapped Brandon Lutnick as chairman and Kyle Lutnick as executive vice chairman. Lutnick's sons, both in their 20s, are now overseeing the group their father ran for more than three decades.
The move cemented the Lutnick family's control over a group with more than 14,000 employees that the Commerce secretary has pledged to keep separate during his time in Trump's Cabinet, where key decisions over tariffs and trade could affect the firm's deals and clients.
Information for this article was contributed by Bill Allison of Bloomberg (WPNS).