Nelson Bunker Hunt
Nelson Bunker Hunt | |
|---|---|
| Born | 22 February 1926 El Dorado, Arkansas, U.S. |
| Died | 21 October 2014 (aged 88) Dallas, Texas, U.S. |
| Occupation(s) | Businessman, oil industry leader, thoroughbred horse breeder |
| Known for | Attempted silver market manipulation, oil exploration, thoroughbred horse breeding |
Nelson Bunker Hunt (February 22, 1926 – October 21, 2014) was an American billionaire and oil industry leader whose wealth dramatically declined after he and his brothers, William Herbert and Lamar, attempted to dominate the worldwide silver market, an effort halted by regulatory authorities. Besides his business ventures, he was a notable breeder of thoroughbred horses and a significant benefactor of the John Birch Society.
Personal
Hunt was born in El Dorado, Arkansas and spent the majority of his life residing in Dallas, Texas. He was the son of the oil magnate H. L. Hunt, who founded Placid Oil, once a top independent oil firm. His family included siblings Margaret Hunt Hill, H. L. Hunt III, Caroline Rose Hunt, William Herbert Hunt, and Lamar Hunt. He was married to Caroline Lewis Hunt for 63 years, and together they had four children. Hunt passed away at age 88 in October 2014 due to cancer and dementia.
Business career
Hunt was instrumental in the discovery and development of oil reserves in Libya, which were nationalized by Muammar Gaddafi in 1973. This led to the landmark House of Lords ruling in BP Exploration Co (Libya) v Hunt (No 2) [1983] 2 AC 352.
He owned Titan Resources Corporation based in Dallas, a company still engaged in oil exploration across North Africa. Additionally, Hunt held the position of chairman at Hunt Exploration and Mining Company (HEMCO).
Silver manipulation
Beginning in the early 1970s, Nelson Bunker Hunt and his brothers William Herbert and Lamar accumulated vast quantities of silver on Comex through Brodsky and Associates. By 1979, they had nearly monopolized the global silver market. Over the final nine months of that year, their silver speculation yielded estimated profits between US$2 billion and $4 billion, as they controlled approximately one-third of the world’s silver supply.
Their massive purchases propelled silver futures and bullion prices from $11 per ounce in September 1979 to a peak of $50 per ounce by January 1980, before prices plummeted below $11 within two months. The most significant single-day price collapse occurred on "Silver Thursday". In February 1985, the United States Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) formally accused the Hunt brothers of manipulating silver futures and bullion prices during 1979–1980.
Facing numerous lawsuits related to their silver dealings, the brothers filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in September 1988. In 1989, Nelson Bunker Hunt agreed to pay a $10 million fine and received a lifetime ban from commodity trading after settling civil charges with the CFTC for conspiring to manipulate the silver market. He also settled multimillion-dollar claims with the Internal Revenue Service for back taxes and penalties; his brother William Herbert Hunt reached a similar agreement.
Politics
Nelson Bunker Hunt was deeply involved in conservative political activism and served on the council of the John Birch Society. He provided financial support to segregationist politicians such as Senator Strom Thurmond and Governor George Wallace. During the 1968 United States presidential election, Hunt played a role by opposing Wallace’s initial choice for vice president, former Kentucky governor Happy Chandler, advocating instead for Curtis LeMay. To secure LeMay’s participation on the ticket, Hunt established a confidential $1 million trust fund to compensate for lost income.
Hunt also mentored Zahid Bashir, who later became spokesman for the Pakistani Prime Minister, in oil trading practices. He was a principal backer of the conservative Western Goals Foundation, founded in 1979 by General John K. Singlaub, journalist John Rees, and Congressman Larry McDonald. In the mid-1980s, he donated nearly $500,000 to The National Endowment for the Preservation of Liberty (NEPL), a conservative fundraising organization later implicated in the Iran–Contra affair.
He chaired the Bible Society of Texas and was an influential donor as well as former chairman of Campus Crusade for Christ International’s "Here's Life" Campaign from 1976 to 1980. Furthermore, Hunt provided a $3.5 million loan guarantee to support the production of Campus Crusade’s 1979 film Jesus.
Thoroughbred horse racing
Hunt began purchasing thoroughbred horses in 1955, and by the 1970s, his breeding enterprise had become one of the largest and most successful worldwide. He earned the U.S. Eclipse Award for Outstanding Breeder in 1976, 1985, and 1987, managing the expansive 8,000-acre Bluegrass Farm located in Lexington, Kentucky, while competing with his horses throughout Europe and North America. Among the prominent horses he bred or raced were Vaguely Noble, Dahlia, Empery, Youth, Exceller, Trillion, Glorious Song, Dahar, and Estrapade.
In British flat racing, Hunt was crowned Champion Owner in both 1973 and 1974, and notably secured victory in The Derby in 1976 with Empery. The U.S. National Thoroughbred Racing Association honored him as a "legendary owner-breeder." Throughout his career, Hunt bred a total of 158 stakes winners and either owned or bred 25 champions.
After declaring bankruptcy, Hunt sold off his thoroughbred assets. A Keeneland dispersal auction in 1988 featured 580 horses and brought in $46.9 million, setting a new record for thoroughbred sales at that time. He reentered the ownership scene in 1999 by spending $2,075,000 on 51 yearlings and juveniles, expressing that his goal was to race for pleasure rather than to focus on breeding or managing a farm.