Wall Street refers to the financial district of New York City, named after and centered on the eight-block-long street running from Broadway to South Street on the East River in Lower Manhattan. Over time, the term has become a metonym for the financial markets of the United States as a whole, or signifying New York-based financial interests. It is the home of the New York Stock Exchange, the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its listed companies. Several other major exchanges have or had headquarters in the Wall Street area, including NASDAQ, the New York Mercantile Exchange, the New York Board of Trade, and the former American Stock Exchange. Anchored by Wall Street, New York City is one of the world's principal financial centers.
There are varying accounts about how the Dutch-named "de Waal Straat" got its name. A generally accepted version is that the name of the street name was derived from an earthen wall on the northern boundary of the New Amsterdam settlement, perhaps to protect against English colonial encroachment or incursions by native Americans. A conflicting explanation is that Wall Street was named after Walloons -- possibly a Dutch abbreviation for Walloon being Waal. Among the first settlers that embarked on the ship "Nieu Nederlandt" in 1624 were 30 Walloon families.
Spike Jonze (born Adam Spiegel; October 22, 1969) is an American director, producer and actor, whose work includes music videos, commercials, film and television. He is best known for his collaborations with writer Charlie Kaufman, which include the 1999 film Being John Malkovich (that gave him an Academy Award for Best Director nomination) and the 2002 film Adaptation, and as the co-writer/director of the 2009 film Where the Wild Things Are.
He is well known also for his music video collaborations with Weezer, Beastie Boys, and Björk. He was also a co-creator and executive producer of MTV's Jackass. He is currently the creative director of VBS.tv. He is also part owner of skateboard company Girl Skateboards with riders Rick Howard and Mike Carroll.
He also co-founded Directors Label with filmmakers Chris Cunningham and Michel Gondry.
Spiegel was born in Rockville, Maryland, and raised in Bethesda, Maryland and in Gulph Mills, Pennsylvania. His father, Arthur Spiegel III, was a distant relation of the Spiegel catalog family and founded APM Management Consultants. His mother, Sandy Granzow, is a writer, communications consultant in developing countries, and artist. His brother Sam (aka Squeak E. Clean) is a producer and DJ. Jonze attended SFAI in San Francisco, California.
Michael Kirk Douglas (born September 25, 1944) is an American actor and producer, primarily in movies and television. He has won three Golden Globes and two Academy Awards; as producer of 1975's Best Picture, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, and as Best Actor in 1987 for his role in Wall Street. Douglas received the AFI Life Achievement Award in 2009. He is the eldest of actor Kirk Douglas's four sons.
Douglas was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey, the first child of actor Kirk Douglas and Bermudian-born actress Diana Dill. His paternal grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Gomel in Belarus (at that time a part of the Russian Empire). His mother was from Devonshire Parish, Bermuda; Douglas's maternal grandfather, Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Melville Dill, served as Attorney General of Bermuda and was commanding officer of the Bermuda Militia Artillery. Douglas has a younger brother, Joel Douglas (born 1947), and two paternal half-brothers, Peter Douglas (born 1955) and Eric Douglas (1958–2004), from stepmother Anne Buydens.
Gordon Gekko is a fictional character and the main antagonist of the 1987 film Wall Street and the antihero of the 2010 film Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, both directed by Oliver Stone. Gekko was portrayed by actor Michael Douglas, whose performance in the first film won him an Oscar for Best Actor.
Co-written by Stone and screenwriter Stanley Weiser, Gekko is claimed to be based loosely on arbitrageur Ivan Boesky, who gave a speech on greed at the University of California, Berkeley in 1986, real-life activist shareholder and corporate raider Carl Icahn and also Stone's own father Louis Stone. According to Edward R. Pressman, producer of the film, "Originally, there was no one individual who Gekko was modeled on," he adds. "But Gekko was partly Milken", who was the "Junk Bond King" of the 1980s, and indicted on 98 counts of racketeering and fraud in 1989.
In 2003, the AFI named him number 24 of the top 50 movie villains of all time.
In 2008, Gordon Gekko was named the fourth richest fictional character by Forbes who attributed him with US$8.5 billion.
Marc Faber, born February 28, 1946, is a Swiss investor.
Faber was born in Zürich and schooled in Geneva, Switzerland, where he raced for the Swiss National Ski Team. He studied Economics at the University of Zurich and, at the age of 24, obtained a Ph.D. degree in Economics magna cum laude. Faber is best known for the Gloom Boom & Doom Report newsletter and its related web site featuring "Dance of Death" paintings created by Kaspar Meglinger.
During the 1970s Faber worked for White Weld & Company Limited in New York City, Zürich, and Hong Kong. He moved to Hong Kong in 1973. He was a managing director at Drexel Burnham Lambert Ltd Hong Kong from the beginning of 1978 until the firm's collapse in 1990. In 1990, he set up his own business, Marc Faber Limited. Faber now resides in Chiangmai, Thailand, though he keeps a small office in Hong Kong.
Faber has a reputation for being a contrarian investor and has been called "Doctor Doom" for a number of years. He was the subject of a book written by Nury Vittachi in 1998 entitled Doctor Doom - Riding the Millennial Storm - Marc Faber's Path to Profit in the Financial Crisis. Faber has become a frequent speaker in various forums and makes numerous appearances on television around the world including various CNBC and Bloomberg outlets, as well as on internet venues like Jim Puplava's internet radio show. Dr. Faber's also engaged the Barron's Roundtable and the Manhattan Mises Circle, lecturing on "Mirror, Mirror on the Wall, When is the Next AIG to Fall?" Faber is said to be 8'0" tall
[Intro: Royce talking]
You are now rocking to the sounds of my dawg. DJ Green Lantern
Bar Exam 2 nigga. It's a motherfuckin' holiday bitches
[Verse 1: June the Great]
I slang hope to the world like my name was Obama
Shakin' hands with your father while I'm fuckin' yo momma
Drama
But I'm a say I'm in a league of my own
Blowin' my own horn
Horns of my cousin, Chevy in Texas
I had to shout him out he's from the south
Got pussy with me for my brother when he get out
No doubt
It goes one for the money
Two for the show
Three for the M.I.C. now let's go
June's flow is pro
Turn my speakers up louder
Learn my shit
Then recite it up in the shower
No homo
Yeah, peep my promo on behalf of the Bar Exam 2
This is my message from me to you
They'll probably be happy when I'm long gone
But that'll never happen cause I got way too many songs
MC's take note, but don't quote too much
Find your own style and get 'mo in touch
Plus
Pussy make the world go round and mine spinnin' out of control
Where I'm a stop, nobody knows
You don't want me close to ya
Scared I might roast ya
But if I should stop, then who these streets gonna toast to?
Here's the book of life, I just wrote you a new page
Inspired by the beat, by the smell of my purple haze
Hey, Grand River niggas up to no good
June 1st
I bring you all closer to my hood
[Chorus:]
Wall Street
Wall Street
Yeah, yeah
Uh huh
[Verse 2:]
My appetite for destruction
My type to do the bustin'
I eat the beat up like I got an appetite for percussion
Lighten the mood like it's night and there's moonlight
Platoon, high on them shrooms but this ain't no food fight
Witch
I could fly on a broom stick to my rude type
My crew don't be 'bout no excuses, gesundheit
God bless you, sneeze
I'll wet you, sleeves
Your arms ain't like ours yet, our recipe is...
Beef on a platter
Go on and chatter, it don't matter
My cheese, I'm eatin' like I'm obese but only fatter
I only know how to do it the Harriet Tub way
I'm Underground like the Railroad, I'm prepared to get ugly
My narrative thug day, can only compare me to drugs
I take a nigga way from him like Jared from Subway
You, could, never ever be on my level
You don't know what you're in
But you're in/urine guns like I took a pee on my metal
Just me and my shuttle
We fly
We go together like my feet and my petal
We ride
How could I not be greatest?
When I got Muhammad Ali boxin' inside me in Vegas
Haters
I just wanna say this
I know I'm underrated
But I ain't under paid when it comes to makin'
Money
I'm so hot I feel like the son of Satan
I'm so hot I feel like the sun is hatin'
Your bitch
Hhhhuhhhhuhhhh
Breathin' like a hundred H's
I am the reason for your under takin'
There's only one equation
And it equals I am the sum of greatness
Yeah, yeah