John Duffield: the fading star once dubbed 'Croesus in a Mondeo'

John Duffield is credited with creating more millionaires than any other financial entrepreneur. Now, however, his New Star Asset Management is all but bust.

"If there is a Signor Sassi, he should keep his head down," says the FT. John Duffield's favourite Knightsbridge restaurant the setting for countless feasts of oysters, lobster and ice-cream in happier times "could be the scene of some crockery throwing" if desperate attempts to save his New Star Asset Management come to nothing. Duffield is a City institution: colourful, abrasive, and renowned for his volatile temper, he is said to have created more millionaires than any other financial entrepreneur both at New Star and at his previous venture, Jupiter. His former wife, the philanthropist Dame Vivien Duffield, paid him the mixed compliment of being "a lousy husband but an excellent fund manager". The latter claim is now being tested to the limit.

When Duffield, 69, launched New Star at the London Planetarium in 2001, he roped in legendary stargazer Sir Patrick Moore to announce the birth of "a new star like no other". Attracted by the big-name managers whose pictures Duffield plastered across hoardings nationally, investors flocked to his funds. And New Star's money men delivered, enabling Duffield, with typical hubris, to slam the performance of rivals as "a disgrace".

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