◼ FINANCE Bloomberg Businessweek July 27, 2020
25Heridestheelevatoralone.Sitsatthedeskalone.
Eatslunchalone.Butmostly,MichaelBethworks
almostaloneinsidea glasshigh-riseontheHudson
RiverinNewJersey,justacrossfromWallStreet.
SinceCovid-19hit,Beth,who’s29,hasneverreally
stoppedcomingtoworkat WallachBethCapital.While
manywerefiguringoutZoomathome,a tinysliver
ofNewYork’sfinancialindustryhasspentthepast
fewmonthsina surrealofficeworldofsilentphones,
darkenedscreens,andemptychairs.Somesaythe
quiethasbeenunsettling.Othersinsistthey’vebeen
wildlyproductivewithoutmeddlesomecolleagues
around.Soonmorewillstarttoshowupasfinancial
institutionsbringemployeesback—withnewstresses
andrisksweighingonofficelife.
Howhasitbeenforthepastfourmonths?
“Exhausting,”Bethsays,standinginthemiddleof
anemptyparkinglotduringwhatwouldnormally
berushhour.He’swearingsneakers,anUnder
Armourpoloshirt,andlightgrayshorts.“Driving
hereeveryday,knowingthatI’mcominghereto
nooneandthatI’mgoingtohavetodoa bunchof
random stuff to keep the office up and running, as
SomeWallStreeters
KeptShowingUp
● Silentphones,darkscreens,andemptychairs
becamepartoftheworkdayroutine
THEBOTTOMLINE WithNewYorkCitybeginningtoreopen,
many Wall Street workers will be returning to their desks. Some
never left.well as try to do my job, it’s a lot. It’s been crazy.”
As New York inches ahead with its reopening, thou-
sands of office workers will have to readjust. Some
expect working from home to be a more permanent
fixture. Others relish the chance to get away from
family and kids and return to the familiar rhythms of
the office. Many more are worried about the poten-
tial danger from things that seemed mundane just
months ago: the commute, elevators, recirculated air.
For Beth, a full-time equity and derivatives trader
and now part-time office supplies caretaker, it meant
decamping from Battery Park City, where he lives
with his fiancée, to his parents’ house in New Jersey
so he could drive instead of taking the train. Staying
off the train has been a psychological relief, even if
he has to borrow his dad’s Audi to get to work. (His
father is one of the firm’s founders.) “It almost feels
like college again,” he says.
His first stop after entering his office building is
the giant hand sanitizer station. He uses a plastic
tool on his keychain to press the elevator button for
the 14th floor. The cleaning service has kept things
immaculate, but Beth still wipes down surfaces each
morning. He grabs takeout at one of the few lunch
spots that stayed open and eats alone at his desk.
All across Wall Street, scores of finance profession-
als have continued coming into work. Some traders
thrived, helping the biggest banks post record-breaking
results. Erika Karp had the option to work remotely
but chose not to—for a while, at least. From March
to late May, the 56-year-old founder and chief exec-
utive officer of Cornerstone Capital walked from her
Upper East Side apartment to her Midtown office—a
mask on her face, homemade lunch in her purse, and
some tissues for the elevator button. “Eventually, I
got really good at using my elbow,” she says.
While her 18 employees have worked from home
since March, Karp says she never felt isolated. Rather,
she had space to think and plan ahead, a luxury she
didn’t always have before the pandemic—or at home
with her three kids doing schoolwork on Zoom. If
an employee had to come in, they’d coordinate to
sit far enough apart. “We’d do a virtual hug from
across the office,” she says. Eventually, Karp, like
many other well-heeled New Yorkers, left the city. In
late May she relocated to Bridgehampton, on Long
Island. Like most, she’s watching the city’s reopen-
ing with a dose of caution. And she assumes it will
take a long time. “I don’t intend to go back to hair
salons or restaurants,” Karp says. “I’m not going to
act like it’s normal. It’s not normal.” �Elena Popina,
with Vildana HajricThis situation puts the Fed in an awkward position
aswell.Itsmonetaryleversaremeanttobepushed
andpulledinanefforttoboostemploymentand
keepinflationfromgettingtoohotorcold.Abuoyant
stock market may help the cause but isn’t supposed
tobea primarygoal.Guggenheim’sMinerd,who’sa
memberofa committeeadvisingthecentralbankon
financialmarkets,recalledhisimpressionfollowing
a recentmeetingofthegroup.
“Idon’tthinkthey’resurewhethertothinkofit
asa bubbleornota bubble,”hesaidinhisinterview
withBloombergTV.“Oneofthecommentsthatwas
madeat themeetingthatI thoughtwasinteresting is:
‘How will we know if it’s a bubble?’ And the answer
is: ‘After the stock market crashes.’” �Michael P.
Regan,withSarahPonczek
THE BOTTOM LINE It’s one thing to see that prices are getting
high, especially in a narrow group of the most popular stocks. But
it’s harder to guess when this might change.
“Eventually,
I got really
good at using
my elbow”