Pot Soars on Wall Street, Real Estate Investors Just High All the Time

reprints


103272286 Pot Soars on Wall Street, Real Estate Investors Just High All the Time A routine “sometimes Wall Street guys do drugs” story on a WSJ blog manages to buck a cliche: apparently cocaine is falling out of favor with the Masters of the Universe, while marijuana use has increased.

The data comes from drug tests at some 270 finance firms and while the numbers of users is low overall — real estate investment trust companies are the worst offenders, by the way — those who relax pharmacologically tend to have marijuana-heavy portfolio, these days. Pot was the reason for 64% of failed drug tests in 2007, in 2009 that jumped to 80%.

Also popular are pills, according to William Heran, the director of a rehab facility crammed with former finance guys.

Mr. Heran has been around long enough to discern a forex trader from an M&A banker. He says the rage these days is a Pez dispenser with the head of a red devil. Inside? Pills of Oxycodone or Percocet.

All of them have the exact same Pez dispenser? Whatever, at least we know why Goldman’s getting a Shake Shack.