Lou Pai Net Worth - Pulptastic

Lou Pai, a Chinese-American businessman and mathematical genius, has a net worth of $200 million. He earned his fortune as the CEO of Enron Energy Services and Enron Xcelerator, a venture capital division of Enron. Pai was known as the invisible CEO during his time at the now-defunct energy company.

What is Lou Pai’s Net Worth?

Lou Pai, a Chinese-American businessman and mathematical genius, has a net worth of $200 million. He earned his fortune as the CEO of Enron Energy Services and Enron Xcelerator, a venture capital division of Enron. Pai was known as “the invisible CEO” during his time at the now-defunct energy company.

Despite being fired and forced to sell most of his Enron shares years before the company’s collapse, Pai is one of the few former Enron executives who ended up with a substantial fortune.

Lou Pai’s Early Life and Career

Lou Pai was born in Nanjing, China in 1946 and moved to the United States at the age of two. His family settled in Maryland where his father became a professor at the University of Maryland. Lou showed a talent for math from a young age and earned a Bachelor’s and Masters Degree in economics from the same university. He went on to work for the Federal government before joining the Securities Exchange Commission in the mid-1970s through 1986.

In 1976, Lou married his first wife Lanna and they had two children before divorcing in 2000.

Lou Pai’s Rise at Enron

In 1987, Lou Pai left the SEC for a job at little-known regional energy supplier Enron. At the time, future-CEO Jeffrey Skilling was working closely with Enron as a consultant for McKinsey. Skilling impressed Enron’s CEO Kenneth Lay and was hired away in 1991.

Pai and Skilling quickly bonded and rose through the ranks of Enron over the next decade. Pai became one of Skilling’s top lieutenants and was put in charge of many key projects and subsidiaries. When Skilling became President of Enron in 1997, one of his first acts was to make Pai the CEO of EES (Enron Energy Services), a position he held through 2001.

Jeff Skillings’s Vision for Enron

Jeff Skillings aimed to transform Enron from a regional energy supplier into a global technology and trading conglomerate. With the deregulation of the energy market, Skillings and Pai worked towards achieving this vision, leading to Enron becoming the fifth largest company in the world by market cap. Enron’s natural gas trading desk was a significant contributor to this growth. Lou Pai was referred to as “the invisible CEO” during Enron’s boom period.

Lou Pai’s Strip Club Antics and Affair with a Stripper

In May 2001, Lou Pai resigned from Enron after it was discovered that he had been using Enron’s corporate jet for personal commuting. However, it was later revealed that his departure may have been linked to an extramarital affair with a stripper.

During his time at Enron, Pai was known for spending excessive amounts of time at Houston-area strip clubs and allegedly bringing strippers back to Enron’s offices for late night parties. His behavior eventually reached the attention of Ken Lay, who had to issue a directive that strippers and strip club tabs could no longer be expensed.

According to legend, Pai had an affair with a married erotic dancer named Melanie Fewell, which resulted in a pregnancy. When Pai’s wife learned of the affair, she filed for divorce.

Co-workers once asked Pai how he hid the smell of strippers and strip clubs from his wife. He reportedly responded by saying that he would stop by a gas station on his drive home and “spill a little gas on my suit” to throw his wife off the scent of his affairs.

Lou Pai’s Fortunate Divorce Filing

Lou Pai, who had an affinity for strippers and abusing corporate expense accounts, was able to walk away with a large fortune from Enron. His first wife’s divorce filing inadvertently helped him shield himself from charges that many other Enron executives faced.

Between May 18 and June 7, 2001, Lou Pai sold 100% of his stake in Enron, selling 911,715 shares for pre-tax proceeds of $270 million. This was just six months before Enron collapsed and filed for bankruptcy.

Due to his timely sale of all his shares, Lou Pai was able to avoid the charges that many other Enron executives faced after the company’s collapse. He settled insider trading charges in July 2008, agreeing to an out-of-court settlement that included a $30 million restitution payment and a $1.5 million fine. He was also barred from serving as an officer or director of a public company until 2013.

Lou Pai’s Controversial Ownership of Taylor Ranch

Lou Pai, the former Enron executive, purchased the 77,500 Taylor Ranch in Colorado for $23 million in 1999, making him the second-largest landowner in the state. The 14,000 square-foot mountain on the property was nicknamed “Mount Pai” by locals. However, Pai stirred up controversy when he attempted to enforce an 1844 Mexican Grant, restricting the number of landowners who could use the property to seven specific landowners who had continuously owned cattle in the area since the grant date. This move angered local residents of Mexican descent, who protested against Pai’s legal maneuvers, with hundreds of protestors marching on the ranch at one point. Despite the controversy, Pai sold the property a year later for $60 million.

Lou and Melanie Pai: From Exotic Dancer to Equestrian Estate Owners

After finalizing his divorce from his first wife, Lou Pai married Melanie Fewell, the exotic dancer he had impregnated. Today, she is known as Melanie Pai, and they have three children together.

Currently, the couple operates Canaan Ranch in both Texas and Virginia, where they are actively involved in the Olympic sport of dressage. In May 2022, they purchased a 21-acre equestrian estate in Wellington, Florida, for $8 million. The property includes three stables with stalls for approximately 40 horses, multiple outdoor jumping areas, five acres of pasture land, and two apartments in addition to the main property.

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