It seems like everyone has followed @GSElevator at some time or another. Occasionally very funny, the Twitter account either satirized or celebrated the highest excesses of the banking industry and Goldman’s uber-wealthy employees. It was tough to tell.
On Dealbook Tuesday, the man behind @GSElevator was unmasked as a 34-year-old former bond executive, John Lefevre, who lives in Texas. Lefevre never actually worked at Goldman—he was a Citigroup employee for years before moving to a boutique firm in Hong Kong—but he had collected dozens of outrageous stories from his time in the industry. “I went into investment banking and I saw a group of people that aren’t as impressive as I thought they were — or as impressive as they thought they were. They defined themselves as human beings by their jobs,” Lefevre said. “I thought… if people only saw the elitist, sexist and out-of-touch things bankers say.’ People had no idea what it is really like.” Hence: The creation of @GSElevator in 2011, and a six-figure book deal early this year.
Lefevre said that despite some of the racist and elitist shit he attributed to GS bankers, he never set out to bash the industry. And in Dealbook, Lefevre sounds like a decent guy who struck gold. But it turns out he might be kind of a joke-stealing douche!
Gawker identified some strangely close connections between @GSElevator’s jokes and those of one-time Jeopardy contestant John Munson. These connections go beyond a tribute tweet every now and then: Jokes are word-for-word reproductions. (And yes, they’re jokes. Even the casual @GSElevator fan should know by now that most things on the feed were never said in a New York or Hong Kong office.)
Munson could be a ghostwriter, but if he’s not @GSElevator has been ripping him off for a while.
Count me as stunned every GS banker doesn’t have a devastating quip ready every time he boards an elevator.
[H/T: Gawker]