When Black wealth is showcased, it’s often celebrities and athletes — the Michael Jordans, the Oprahs, the Lebron Jameses — who are front and center. To be sure, these figures are inspiring examples of Black financial success. But they aren’t the only examples.
Consider Wall Street. While the top ranks of finance are still overwhelmingly white and male, throughout the years, we’ve tracked a growing number of women and people of color working in the sector who are also active philanthropists. And while athletes and entertainers can earn quite a bit of cash, their wealth still tends to pale in comparison to the money that can be made at the top of, say, a hedge fund. So it’s worth tracking the wealth and power of Black Americans who’ve made it on Wall Street — wealth which can then be deployed toward philanthropic giving.
Note that there are Black pioneers in finance from earlier eras, like Jeremiah Hamilton, who built wealth in the 1800s as an unlikely broker on Wall Street, and once narrowly escaped a lynch mob during the 1863 New York City Draft Riots (remember “Gangs of New York?”). He ultimately left behind a $2 million fortune, the equivalent of about $250 million today.
But even though they’re still relatively few and far between, the ranks of Black philanthropists on Wall Street have grown and are growing through the present. With that in mind, we’ve compiled a list of top Black philanthropists on Wall Street today, with details about who they are, what they’re funding, and what to expect from them down the line.
Robert F. Smith, Vista Equity Partners
Currently the richest Black American, Robert F. Smith is worth $8 billion. The Goldman Sachs alumnus established Vista Equity Partners, one of the best-performing private equity firms with nearly $100 billion in assets.
Smith’s philanthropy — via individual donations and his associated foundation — is going strong, too, including a recent $15 million STEM gift for underrepresented students at his alma mater Cornell. This follows up on a $50 million gift to Cornell in 2016.
“When I look at philanthropic giving, while I’ll do what I call event-oriented giving, I like to look for sustainable outcomes and programs that can be done at scale. This is the way to change the dimension of someone’s existence and the direction of their life,” Smith told me when I spoke with him last year for a profile on his giving.
Higher education is only one of Smith’s many philanthropic interests. In recent years, he has quietly become one of the largest private donors supporting America’s national parks. Then there’s his support for the arts, and his grand plan to reverse corporate America’s legacy of structural racism, which he dubs “the 2% solution.” Since its 2014 founding, Smith’s Fund II Foundation has awarded more than $250 million.
Kenneth Chenault, American Express
The Bowdoin and Harvard Law graduate is one of the first African Americans to become the CEO of a Fortune 500 firm. Chenault joined American Express in 1981 as director of strategic planning. He rose through the ranks, eventually holding the title of CEO from 2001 through 2018. Chenault is now chairman and managing director of the venture capital firm General Catalyst.
On the philanthropic front, the 71-year-old still does not seem to have a formal family foundation. But he and his wife Kathryn are founding donors of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture, having donated at least $1 million prior to the museum’s opening. Kathryn has an interest in the arts and expanding opportunities for young people. She’s a trustee of Studio Museum in Harlem, which the couple support. The Chenaults have also given steady support to Morehouse College.
Frank Baker, Siris Capital Group
The Detroit native attended the University of Chicago and Harvard Business School. Baker credits Sponsors for Educational Opportunity (SEO), a free, eight-year academic program that helps underrepresented students, for his start in business at Goldman Sachs. He went on to cofound Siris Capital Group, a middle-market private equity firm.
In 2020, the Bakers made a $1 million scholarship for Spelman College graduates. And in the spring of 2022, Baker and his wife Laura Day made a $1.2 million donation to Florida A&M to establish the Frank and Laura Baker Graduation Fund, which will provide funding for students who are qualified to graduate in four years but have an outstanding account balance. At his alma mater, the University of Chicago, Baker made a $7 million gift to endow undergraduate scholarships and internships for lower-income students.
“My giving is centered around education, leveling the playing field, and providing more access. Laura and I wanted to make sure we were consistently giving back,” he told me this October.
John W. Rogers Jr., Ariel Investments
Chicago native and Princeton graduate John W. Rogers Jr. cofounded Ariel Investments in the early 1980s. Ariel Investments is notable as the first minority-owned mutual fund company. Rogers’ great-grandfather owned Stratford Hotel in the Greenwood District of Tulsa, Oklahoma — the prominent Black community also known as “Black Wall Street,” which was destroyed by terrorism in 1921. “I can imagine he was never quite the same. [I think] he lost some of his confidence and his entrepreneurial spirit,” Rogers once told Black Enterprise.
Rogers’ philanthropy strongly focuses on his native Chicagoland, with millions going to the University of Chicago and its Lab Schools. Rogers is also interested in financial literacy and donated $1 million to endow scholarships for eighth graders graduating from Ariel Community Academy, a public school located on the South Side of Chicago.
Mellody Hobson, Ariel Investments
Another Princeton grad, Hobson serves as president of Ariel Investments and is married to billionaire filmmaker George Lucas. Hobson has a passion for financial literacy. She serves as chair of After School Matters, a nonprofit that provides Chicago teens with after-school resources, and is a board member of the Chicago Public Education Fund.
The Hobson/Lucas Family Foundation held some $1.1 billion in assets in the 2019 fiscal year and made nearly $50 million in donations in the realms of arts and culture, education, the environment, social justice, and a range of other causes. Hobson and Lucas take a relatively low profile with this giving — this large foundation doesn’t even have a website. One highlight of the couple’s giving is their Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, currently expected to open in L.A. in 2025.
Eddie C. Brown, Brown Capital Management
Born in the rural town of Apopka, Florida, Brown attended Howard University, NYU and Indiana University. He worked at IBM before launching Brown Capital Management in 1983. He and his wife, Sylvia, established the Eddie C. and C. Sylvia Brown Family Foundation at the Baltimore Community Foundation in 1994, which focuses on health (specifically cancer and HIV), the arts, and K-12 education. Brown and Sylvia created the Turning the Corner Achievement Program (T-CAP), an education initiative that targets at-risk middle school students in Baltimore. The family also gave a multimillion-dollar gift to establish the Brown Center at Maryland Institute College of Art. University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) is home to the Brown Capital Management Faculty Institute of Entrepreneurship.
Stanley O’Neal, Merrill Lynch
Born in Alabama, Stanley O’Neal attended General Motors Institute (now Kettering University) and then Harvard Business School. He worked at GM as a treasury analyst before joining Merrill Lynch in the early 1980s. He was appointed CFO in the late 1990s, and a few years later, became CEO and president. He’s considered the first Black American to run a major Wall Street firm. Stanley O’Neal moves his philanthropy through the O’Neal Foundation, a low-profile charity with a particular focus on education and other causes that have personal connections to the family.
Suzanne Shank, Siebert Williams Shank
Raised in Georgia, Shank graduated from Georgia Tech and Wharton. She was a structural engineer for General Dynamics and went on to become a founding partner of Siebert Cisneros Shank & Co., LLC., a full-service investment banking and financial services company founded in 1996. The firm has rebranded as Siebert Williams Shank & Co., where Shank is now president and CEO.
Shank does not appear to have a formal family foundation, but she is interested in promoting mentorship for inner-city youth. She supports the Atlanta-based HBCU Spelman College (she didn’t attend, but her mother is an alumna) and is a member of its board of trustees. Shank also supports her alma mater UPenn, including its School of Veterinary Medicine, as well as the Detroit Institute of the Arts.
