Wall Street still betting big on Jeb Bush, overlooking slide in polls - The Wall Street Journal.

Wall Street is still betting on Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush, fundraising reports released Thursday show, despite a precipitous slide in the polls that cost him his front-running status.  But in a sign of how Mr. Bush’s fundraising pace has slowed down, he raised less from the financial industry in the last three months than he did in the first 15 days of his campaign alone.

Of the top 10 employers listed by Mr. Bush’s donors, half are financial firms: Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, Neuberger Berman and Barclays, where Mr. Bush previously worked as a consultant making about $2 million a year.

In the three months that ended Sept. 30, Mr. Bush raised about $200,000 from the employees of 11 major financial firms, less than 60% of what he raised from those firms in the first 15 days of his campaign, in June.  That is roughly seven times the amount collected apiece by Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Ohio Gov. John Kasich, and 11 times the amount collected by Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, whose wife is on leave from her job as a managing director at Goldman Sachs..

While the Wall Street money has helped Mr. Bush outgun most of his Republican rivals in the past three months, his close ties to the financial industry, kinship to two former occupants of the White House, and business-friendly agenda appear to be muddling his efforts to pitch himself as a “disrupter” of the political establishment. Over the summer, candidates such as Donald Trump, Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina surpassed Mr. Bush in the polls.

More than half of Americans are “angry because our political system seems to only be working for the insiders with money and power, like those on Wall Street or in Washington,” according to a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll conducted Sept. 20-24.

“The tea party movement sees Wall Street and the Chamber of Commerce as corrupting influences on politics, and I think that hurts Jeb Bush because of the perception that he’s the candidate the financiers of the party like,” said Erick Erickson of the conservative Red State blog.

Anthony Scaramucci, founder of SkyBridge Capital, a global investment firm, recently joined Mr. Bush’s team after Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker dropped out of the race. He said the financial industry has been unfairly targeted by other presidential candidates.  “I don’t like seeing these attacks on hardworking people. Some of the anger is justified but you have to get the policy right,” Mr. Scaramucci said. “The guys on Wall Street are not ideological as much as they are practical and looking for someone who can solve problems, and they think Jeb Bush has the wisdom and credibility to pull it off.”

Mr. Bush’s tax plan would reduce corporate and individual tax rates, as well as lower taxes paid on investments. The plan’s biggest beneficiaries: the top 1% of earners, according to an analysis by the business-backed Tax Foundation. Like many conservatives, Mr. Bush opposes the new Dodd-Frank regulations on the financial industry.

Mr. Bush is targeting two tax breaks popular on Wall Street: the deduction of interest on debt and “carried interest,” which allows investment-fund managers to pay lower taxes on much of what they earn. But it is unclear if closing those loopholes would mean Wall Street executives would pay more in taxes because of the lower corporate and individual rates.

“Jeb’s chunk is interesting because these are bettors, and you wonder what they’re betting on,’’ he said. “They are emotionally invested in a Jeb Bush win because he’s the status quo and one of the only people who’s not talking about blowing up Wall Street.” - Read More at WSJ

Wall Street Still Betting Big on Jeb Bush, Overlooking Slide in Polls 

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