Napoleon Brandford was born in a troublesome neighborhood within the early-Nineteen Fifties, and raised by a single mother. What occurred subsequent was towards the percentages – and that's a significant understatement.
Brandford led his highschool basketball crew to an Indiana state championship. He went to varsity and was destined to go professional however blew out his knee. He pivoted and went to graduate faculty. He began on the backside rungs on Wall Road. He based his personal funding financial institution. It financed a number of the greatest offers within the municipal bond market.
If this seems like a rags-to-riches story worthy of a film – it's. On The Cash has discovered that Brandford's life story is slated to be made right into a function movie referred to as “Undefeated.”
Brandford tells me the movie is within the pre-production part, and can start capturing in January. He has teamed up with Keith L. Craig, a former Disney government and retired US Military sergeant main who now runs Porter-Craig Movie & Media of Beverly Hills, Calif.
To play Brandford, the agency has tapped veteran actor Keith David, a Julliard-trained actor who has appeared in over 400 roles together with hits reminiscent of “Platoon” and most not too long ago “American Fiction”.
David, 69, tells On The Cash “It's not on a regular basis that one has the pleasure of assembly a hero, however to have the chance to play him is proof of God's grace.
Making David preferrred for the function is that he does bear a outstanding likeness to Brandford, 73. Each are tall males with the physiques of former athletes.
“I've been spending a number of time speaking to Keith concerning the intricacies of the municipal bond market,” Brandford tells On The Cash.
As for Brandford's bio, the specifics are that he grew up in East Chicago Indiana, and his highschool crew received the Hoosier State championship in 1970. He went to the College of Nevada on a basketball scholarship. After that devastating knee harm, he got here again residence and enrolled at Purdue College, then graduate faculty on the College of Southern California.
He went to work on Wall Road at a time when African-American funding bankers had been an anomaly. He labored for main Wall Road corporations after which began his personal store. Within the Nineteen Nineties and thru the 2000s he was a fixture on largest muni bond offers, together with these issued by what would turn into his residence state of California.
Full disclosure: I've identified Brandford for 30 years; I think about him a good friend and I spoke at conferences sponsored by his agency, Siebert, Brandford, Shank, which he retired from again in 2016.
That didn't cease me from writing concerning the travails of his profession, like his messy breakup with a former accomplice simply when he and his agency grew to become one of many market's prime underwriters of municipal debt.
I additionally wrote about his resurgence when he teamed up with the legendary Muriel Siebert and his different longtime enterprise accomplice Suzanne Shank, and as soon as once more grew to become a dominant power in underwriting debt for cities and states.
What set Brandford aside was his skill to manage and adapt to modifications within the enterprise and in his profession – and hold constructing.
You don't do any of that in the event you're born with a silver spoon in your mouth. I can't wait to see this one play out on the silver display.
