Wall Street Veteran Howard Rubin Charged With Sex Trafficking

Howard Rubin, a former Salomon Brothers bond trader immortalized in Michael Lewis’ “Liar’s Poker,” was charged Friday with sex trafficking.

Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn unsealed a 10-count indictment accusing Rubin, 70, of recruiting women between 2009 and 2019 and coercing them into commercial sex acts in New York, Bloomberg reported.

His former personal assistant Jennifer Powers was also charged. Rubin was arrested at his home in Fairfield, Connecticut. He also faces a bank fraud charge for allegedly lying to a lender about ongoing litigation while securing a mortgage for Powers’ Texas home, which he financed.

Lawyers for Rubin and Powers declined to comment.

The case adds a criminal chapter to years of civil litigation against Rubin. In 2022, he was ordered to pay $3.85 million to women who testified they were lured to his Manhattan penthouse for abusive encounters. His attorneys argued the women had consented and signed agreements, but a Brooklyn jury found him liable for sex trafficking and battery.

Prosecutors now allege Rubin and Powers ran a scheme that spanned a decade, arranging travel for women to meet Rubin under false pretenses.

Rubin’s career trajectory once epitomized the excesses and innovations of 1980s Wall Street. At Salomon Brothers, he helped pioneer the collateralized mortgage obligation, a derivative that reshaped global finance. Lewis portrayed him in “Liar’s Poker” as a cerebral young trader who analyzed homeowner behavior to predict mortgage prepayments. Rubin later parlayed that expertise into a $1 million-a-year deal at Merrill Lynch, before stints at Bear Stearns and, eventually, Soros Fund Management, where he ran mortgage-backed securities until 2015.

Rubin’s name, once associated with financial engineering that fueled decades of real estate and credit growth, is now linked to an alleged criminal enterprise of coercion and abuse. His case also highlights the vulnerability of women recruited into sex work under the guise of consensual arrangements — a dynamic prosecutors say Rubin exploited with his wealth and power.

If convicted, Rubin faces the possibility of a lengthy prison sentence.

— Eric Weilbacher