Sam Wyly

Samuel E. Wyly, known as Sam Wyly (born October 4, 1934), is an American entrepreneur and businessman, author, philanthropist, and major contributor to conservative candidates. He appeared on Forbes's list of richest Americans first in 2000 with a net worth of $750 million, and he remained on that list through 2010 with a net worth of $1 billion; that year, he was charged with tax fraud by the SEC and IRS, eventually leading to $500 million in settlements and bankruptcy declaration.

Early life and education

Sam Wyly was born in 1934 to parents Flora and Charles Wyly, Sr. of Lake Providence, Louisiana. His family descended from a long line of Presbyterian and Episcopalian ministers, college founders, and teachers. Wyly's paternal grandfather was a lawyer who managed plantation assets and helped poor Black convicts get paroled from Angola Prison. His maternal grandfather was a doctor.

He began working at an early age, helping his parents publish a weekly newspaper entitled The Delhi Dispatch in Richland Parish. He sold advertising, wrote stories, sent telegrams for oil and gas workers, folded and addressed the finished papers, delivered daily newspapers from the bus stop on Highway 80, and cleaned the printing presses. In the summer, he rough necked in the Delhi Oil Field.

Wyly attended Delhi High School, graduating in 1952. During his senior year, he served as student body president. Wyly played nose guard on his high school football team. During his high school and undergraduate degrees, he went by the nickname "Bubba".

Sam attended Louisiana Tech University where he studied journalism and accounting, partly financing his tuition by selling class rings. Sam was elected class president and student senate president.

Wyly earned an MBA at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor in 1957, where he dropped the "Bubba" and became "Sam." He was Michigan's first Paton scholar. Wyly took the program's first computer course, which led him to code programs in machine language on the IBM 650 computer. He quickly recognized the computer's productivity potential within the farming industry.

Business career

After Michigan, Wyly went to Air Force Boot Camp in San Antonio and to Dallas for a job with IBM. He and Ross Perot were classmates at IBM's education center. Three and a half years later, Wyly left IBM for Honeywell, establishing their computer business in Dallas, Ft. Worth, and Oklahoma. When Honeywell rejected his plan for a new technology computing center to replace the obsolete Univac at SMU, he quit to do it himself. Wyly started his own company in 1963.

Wyly played a significant role in the following businesses:

• 1963: Founded University Computing Company (UCC), to serve engineers, scientists, and researchers. He capitalized the company with his own $1,000 plus commitments from customers including Sun Oil Company, Texas Instruments and SMU, and $650,000 borrowed from the First National Bank in Dallas, now Bank of America, on the cover of Wyly's Dallas Got It Right!. The company went public in September 1965, the month his twin daughters, Laurie and Lisa, were born. In four years, UCC stock gained 100–1 over its IPO price. Many employees and early investors became millionaires. By 1969, it was one of only five companies headquartered in Texas with a market capitalization of $1 billion or more.
• 1967: Bought the ten-store restaurant chain Bonanza Steakhouse which served steak and potatoes and salad for $2. Sam ran TV ads using the actors who played "Hoss," "Little Joe," and "Pa Cartwright" from the TV series Bonanza. Bonanza grew from 10 to 600 restaurants when he sold it to John Kluge, a German-born entrepreneur, then the richest man in America.
• 1968: Acquired Gulf Insurance to help fund his biggest dream - a nationwide digital network to compete with AT&T, then the national telephone monopoly. Their plant was based on analogue technology—good for voice calls—but, too slow for computer to computer talk. Gene Bylinsky of Fortune wrote, "Sam Wyly builds a telephone company for computers." In his 1968 keynote speech to the Spring Joint Computer Conference in Atlantic City, Wyly said, "The computer user has dialed into a busy signal."
• 1968: Co-founded Earth Resources Company, an oil-refining and silver-mining company, that built a refinery in North Pole, Alaska to make jet fuel for airplanes flying to Asia over the Arctic Sea. The Memphis refinery "got the lead out" of gasoline and fueled the fast growth of Federal Express and overnight air mail delivery
• Late 1960s and early 1970s a trustee of SMU and director of First National Bank—then youngest at the time for both.
• 1972: Built a computer keyboard plant to create jobs for Arapaho and Shoshone workers on the Wind River Indian Reservation in Wyoming.
• 1973: He divided UCC into four companies, including Datran, which began construction of a US digital network to transmit data among 27 American cities in direct competition with AT&T. He was unable to capitalize Datran at $400 million and Wall Street disappeared for over a decade when there weren't any technology IPOs for 14 years. Venture capital investing shrank 95 percent. Home mortgage rates rose to 20 percent. Wyly liquidated Datran in bankruptcy in 1976 and filed a $300 million anti-trust suit against AT&T for abuse of its monopoly power and predatory pricing. The courts and Congress forced the bust up of the monopoly, citing Datran as a major reason. Unable to afford lawyers' fees, he engaged Texas lawyer, Bob Strauss, — later Chairman of the Democratic Party — to fight the legal battle for a contingency fee of 28 percent of any winnings. Four years later it was the largest fee ever paid to a Dallas firm. The monopoly was busted into eight companies competing with each other and they paid a $50 million settlement to Wyly's company. FCC attorney said Datran's effort was a major key to this USA policy change toward free market competition versus regulated monopoly. Strauss later became President George H. W. Bush's Ambassador to Russia and AT&T ultimately headquartered in Dallas.
• 1981: Co-founded Sterling Software. Focused on mainframe software and sold in 2000 for $4 billion, and its spin-off of Sterling Commerce sold to AT&T for another $4 billion.
• 1982: Bought ten arts-and-crafts Michaels stores. Today over 1,300. In July 2006, Bain and Blackstone purchased the company for $6 billion. Sam's sale protected shareholders from massive losses in the Crash of 2009.
• In 1990, co-founded hedge fund Maverick Capital, which by 2003 had about $8 billion in assets. Beginning in 1993, his son Evan, a Maverick co-founder, and money manager Lee S. Ainslie III managed the fund.
• In 1996, IPOed 19 percent of Sterling Commerce for $288 million in the "dot.com" boom of 1995–2000. Paid out the other 81 percent to Sterling Software shareholders as a tax-free dividend. Reference Sterling Software SEC filings.
• In 2000, sold Sterling Commerce to AT&T for $3.9 billion. Five years later in 2005, AT&T resold the company for $1.4 billion to IBM.
• In 2002, co-founded Ranger Capital, a fund focused on small-cap stocks.
• As of 2006, Wyly was co-founder with son, Evan, the largest clean-energy producer Green Mountain Energy. replacing electricity made by older, dirty, coal plants with cleaner natural gas, wind, and solar power. Green Mountain became the clean-energy supplier to the Empire State Building in New York.
• In 2006, Wyly was the largest investor in the online social networking company Zaadz.com at an estimated 1.5m.
• In March 2007, Forbes magazine estimated Wyly's net worth to be $1.1 billion. He was on the “Forbes 400” for nine years.

Books

Cheryl and Sam Wyly purchased Explore Booksellers and Bistro in January 2007, ending concern by Aspen, Colorado locals that the only book store would be converted into condos.

Wyly's memoir, 1,000 Dollars & an Idea, was published in September 2008. His last book was The Immigrant Spirit: How Newcomers Enrich America, and his May 2018 book is Dallas Got It Right!, co-authored with Laurie Matthews and Andrew Wyly.

His illustrated biography, Beyond Tallulah, How Sam Wyly Became America's Boldest Big-Time Entrepreneur, by Dennis Hamilton (Melcher Media) was published in 2011. Hamilton began writing about Sam in software journals in the 1970s.

Sam and his son Andrew published their book, Texas Got It Right!, in October 2012. The book claims to explain why California, New York, and the Rust Belt states are losing jobs to Texas and the Southern and Rocky Mountain states.

Politics

In 1968, Sam Wyly was a delegate to the Republican Convention at the request of Chuck Percy, an Illinois Senator and former CEO who he met at a “Young Presidents’” event. After Percy lost the nomination, Wyly became Chairman for the "Nixon For President" campaign in Texas. It was the first time that Republican presidential money had matched that of Democrats in Texas, which had been part of the "Democratic Solid South" since the Civil War.

Nixon, and later President Ford, named Wyly chairman of a commission to foster businesses in mostly Black neighborhoods. Wyly had earlier worked with Joe Kirven, head of the Dallas Negro Chamber of Commerce, on a similar effort.

In 1992, his friends Ross Perot and George H. W. Bush both ran for president. Perot got 20 percent, but with two Texans on the ballot, "another Bubba" from Texarkana—Bill Clinton—won the White House. Perot, Clinton, and Wyly all grew up less than 100 miles from each other in Louisiana, Arkansas and Texas.

In March 2007, commenting on the purchase of a local bookstore by Wyly and his wife Cheryl, the Aspen Times noted that the Wyly family "has been known not only for its philanthropic efforts, but also its large contributions to conservative political campaigns and candidates." Sam backed George H. W. Bush for president in 1980 and 1988. Sam backed George W. Bush's run for Congress in West Texas in 1978, for governor in 1994, and president in 2000 and 2004.

Philanthropy

Wyly and his late brother, Charles, spent more than $160 million on a wide range of charities in the last 25 years.

In 1968, he set up the Sam Wyly Foundation to help black business owners.

Wyly provided local matching money to get a Ford Foundation grant for the creation of "The Jim Lehrer News Hour." Lehrer told The Aspen Institute, "Without Sam Wyly, there would be no News Hour."

With Charles, he funded the 16-story Tower of Learning at Louisiana Tech, designed by the Bastrop architect Hugh G. Parker, Jr., in memory of their father (1973). They also funded a $10 million gift to build Sam Wyly Hall at the University of Michigan (2000).

Wyly has been a significant supporter of Salvation Army, Deaf Action Center, Human Rights Organizations, animal shelters in Dallas and Hillsboro, Texas, and Aspen, health care for people surviving with Lou Gehrig's disease, and the Aspen Writers' Foundation. He supported the Dallas Theater Center on Turtle Creek for decades, and was a key contributor to the Wyly Theatre in downtown Dallas.

In 2015, Wyly founded WylyBooks Company, a nonprofit to fund his storytelling about America's history and future.

Legal Matters

Federal Government Lawsuits

In 1979, Wyly settled Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) charges that he made undisclosed payments to associates to buy up company bonds as part of a plan to stave off bankruptcy for University Computing after the $100 million Datran loss. He settled without acknowledging any wrongdoing.

In August 2006, the Dallas Morning News reported that Sam and Charles Wyly were again under investigation by the SEC, a grand jury in Dallas and a grand jury in New York, regarding their use of potentially illegal offshore tax shelters. No criminal charges were made by either Grand Jury. Senate investigators allege that the Wyly brothers used the offshore trusts to buy $30 million worth of artwork, jewelry, furniture and other items for their personal use. The Wyly brothers denied any wrongdoing, and stated that they just followed the advice of their lawyers and CPAs.

On July 29, 2010, the SEC charged Charles and Sam Wyly with fraud for violating federal securities laws governing ownership and trading of securities by corporate insiders. Sam was surprised with the charges, because historically such cases were brought when public investors lost money. In these companies— Michaels, Sterling Software, and Sterling Commerce—public investors had profits well above the averages.

The Wyly brothers made an immense fortune for themselves, employees and stockholders through investments in Michaels Stores and several software companies. They had been accused of avoiding their tax obligations by transferring stock options in Michaels and Sterling Software Inc. to offshore trusts after receiving advice from a lawyer who promoted foreign trusts as a method of asset protection and tax deferral. On May 12, 2014, a civil jury in New York found the Wyly brothers liable on counts for use of offshore trusts. On July 11, 2014, Sam Wyly and his late brother Charles, were found not liable for insider trading by a U.S. Judge in New York.

On October 19, 2014 Sam Wyly filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, having lost one of the cases brought by the SEC, and wanting to force the IRS to “put up or shut up” about any taxes he owed related to his family's offshore trusts. The IRS had been auditing his tax returns for a decade without ever telling him whether he owed any additional taxes.

In 2016, Wyly settled with the SEC, entering into a settlement agreement under which he agreed to pay $198.1 million. “This is a significant step towards resolving Mr. Wyly’s disputes with the government and allowing him to exit from bankruptcy,” said Jim Lee, a lawyer at Vinson & Elkins.

The following year, Wyly sold his home in Highland Park, Texas.

Internal Revenue Service

In April 2015, the Internal Revenue Service filed claims amounting to $3.2 billion for income taxes, interest and penalties against Wyly and the estate of his late brother. His lawyer called the IRS claims "unfair and absurd." The largest tax claim ever imposed against an individual. Wyly jokes that this was an IRS "billing error." "They sent us Exxon's tax bill by mistake. Exxon's headquarters is a few miles from my house."

In June 2016, the Court ordered Wyly to pay $1.1 billion in taxes, interest and penalties. The IRS moved to collect from the offshore trusts that had been set up by Wyly. He settled with the SEC in October 2016 and with the IRS in October 2019.

Wyly said he received advice that the Isle of Man was a good place for asset protection — a place good for deferring taxes, not avoiding taxes. He had relied on the advice of their lawyers and accountants regarding the legality of the offshore trusts.

Personal life

Wyly and his brother Charles, older by a year, were close all their life. They played high school football, attended Louisiana Tech University, and joined Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity together. They worked together in a large number of businesses that they either owned or ran. Charles was killed in a car accident in Aspen's Roaring Fork Valley in 2011.

From 1960 to 1976, Wyly was married to Rosemary Acton. In 1978, he married Victoria L. Steele.

Wyly was married to Cheryl from 1994 to 2016. Cheryl was a former Texas All-State volleyball player at Farmers Branch High School and Valedictorian of Texas A&M's School of Architecture.

Wyly has six adult children, Evan, twins Laurie and Lisa, Kelly, Andrew, and Christiana. In April 2018, Christiana Wyly, an environmental activist, married entrepreneur Kimbal Musk, the younger brother of entrepreneur Elon Musk.