Insiders Talk 'The Real Wolf Of Wall Street': Movie Only Showed A 'Mild Version' Of The True Story

In 1991, a Forbes magazine article described Jordan Belfort as a “twisted Robin Hood who takes from the rich and gives to himself and his merry band of brokers,” and said Stratton Oakmont, the brokerage firm that he founded, specialized in “pushing dicey stocks on gullible investors.” A handful of years after that article was published, he was charged with money laundering and orchestrating a pump-and-dump scheme. He chronicled his wild days at Stratton in a memoir, and his story got the Hollywood treatment. Directed by Martin Scorsese, “The Wolf of Wall Street” grossed hundreds of millions of dollars worldwide, racked up five Oscar nominations, and starred actor Leonardo DiCaprio. But people close to Belfort—both personally and professionally—say the movie and book don't tell the whole story. Howie Gelfand, an ex-Stratton Oakmont employee, and Ross Portenoy, a former close friend of Belfort, join “Forbes True Crime” to discuss their stories that are featured in the docuseries, “The Real Wolf of Wall Street.”

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