100 Entrepreneurs Who Changed The World
8. J.P. Morgan 1837-1913
“Go as far as you can see; when you get there, you’ll be able to see farther.”
An American financier, banker, and philanthropist, John Pierpont Morgan was the king of corporate finance and industrial consolidation. Morgan was wise investor and master with money. In 1892, he arranged the merger of Edison General Electric and Thomson-Houston Electric Company to form the consumer appliance giant, General Electric. In 1901 he merged the Federal Steel Company (which he had financed) with the Carnegie Steel Company and a host of other steel and iron businesses, into The United States Steel Corporation. He had considerable influence over US business and Congress, leading the team of banking experts who averted the 1907 financial crisis. To this day, his namesake, the JP Morgan investment bank, still lives today,
after merging with Chase bank in 2000.
