Introducing The Pirate of Prague

The Pirate of Prague

Apple TV+ / Blanchard House

True Crime, News, Society & Culture

4.2 • 849 Ratings

🗓️ 6 November 2023

⏱️ 3 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

A charming young Czech promises staggering returns. An entire country’s oil industry is up for grabs. America’s top investors want in. Sounds too good to be true? Damn right it is.

This is a story of private jets, $20,000 dinners, and suitcases stuffed with cash. It’s also a tale about the collapse of communism, the free-for-all that followed, and the birth of the oligarchs. And it’s a story of plain-old human greed...of just how far the rich may go to get even richer. Viktor Kožený smooth-talked his super-wealthy Aspen neighbors and a Wall Street titan into investing huge sums of cash to snap up Azerbaijan’s state-owned oil company. Host Joe Nocera and investigative journalist Peter Elkind follow the trail, beginning in the Bahamas, where the charismatic financial genius has been lying low.

The Pirate of Prague is an Apple Original podcast, produced by Blanchard House. Follow and listen on Apple Podcasts.

apple.co/pirate

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	An entire country's oil industry is up for grabs, for cheap. And a young Czech guy hustling for
0:09.5	investors, you never met anyone like him. He's brilliant. Victor's brilliant. Mr. Charming,
0:17.3	sir like movie star charming. But the very thing that I loved about him, which was his brilliance,
0:23.5	was also the thing that was lethal about him.
0:30.7	It all starts with a party, a massive party, in a mansion on top of a mountain.
0:39.2	Even his super-rich neighbors are blown away.
0:42.7	One of the best parties I've ever gone to in my life.
0:46.2	Everyone wanted an invitation.
0:48.8	But what his guests don't realize
0:51.4	is that their charming host has big plans.
0:56.6	He said, you can invest and you're going to make a lot of money.
1:01.0	How?
1:02.2	Well, remember that oil business I talked about?
1:06.3	They had a billion barrels of oil in the Caspian Sea.
1:09.4	We would own oil for pennies a barrel.
1:12.0	He's talked about the potential of many billions of dollars. He lands some of America's
1:19.3	smartest investors. I'm not a schmuck. I'm not a fool. I have an impeccable reputation.
1:30.3	The Czech Charmer is about to take them for the ride of their lives.
1:36.3	I'm talking private jets and $20,000 dinners.
1:41.3	They're going to fall in love with this guy. And they're going to invest millions.
1:48.0	I was on the planes.
1:50.0	I saw those suitcases of cash, 25 million bucks each.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Apple TV+ / Blanchard House, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Apple TV+ / Blanchard House and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.