i will be shutting with an -- bob benmosche, former chief executive of aig. i traveled through croatia to spend time with this retired it tighten. when you come here to you instantly relax? >> at his vineyard. he recounts how he turns around the company left four dead. >> you thought i had a company worth zero dollars. >> all dealing with a very personal struggle. >> they told me i had nine months or a year to live. i said i have an obligation to resign if i cannot handle the chemotherapy. >> robert was born in brooklyn in 1934. early in his childhood his father moved the family to the catskill mountains, but shortly afterwards, his father died of a heart attack, leaving his mother and three other siblings a quarter of a million dollars in debt and with a half completed hotel. from there, money, having enough of it, became a driving force in benmosche's life. soon after graduating from alfred university, he rose up the ranks of wall street's biggest firms, chase manhattan and metlife, where he became ceo. it was in 2009, three years after he retired from metl

. >> i will be chatting with retired chief executive bob benmosche. i traveled to spend time with this retired wall street titan where he owns a vineyard. >> we have a ways to go. >> and recounts how he turned around a company left for dead. >> i had a company with a value of zero. today it is almost $80 billion. >> all while dealing with a personal struggle. >> with this illness, i have nine months to a year to live. that's what i was told. and then they put me on this aggressive chemotherapy. i said i have an obligation to resign if i cannot handle the chemotherapy. >> robert was born in brooklyn in 1934. early in his childhood his father moved the family to the catskill mountains, but shortly afterwards, his father died of a heart attack, leaving his mother and three other siblings a quarter of a million dollars in debt and with a half completed hotel. from there, money, having enough of it, became a driving force in benmosche's life. soon after graduating from alfred university, he rose up the ranks of wall street's biggest firms, chase manhattan

you tell me, maybe i am wrong, maybe i am crazy. ♪ >> bob benmosche's fight over his own pay turned outbe a small battle compared to the full assault. -- full-on assault over pay for aig employees. benmosche found himself at war with lawmakers, regulators, and the public over $165 million in bonuses to traders in the financial products unit, the same unit that almost sank aig. i want to read a quote from david scott from georgia. he said, "we are, in effect, at war." at war over the $165 million of bonuses. >> why weren't they at war at the $100 million that was spent between four firms to watch the people of aig work, to see if they are doing the right thing at the whatever it is the congressman said, we spent $100 million watching people that you paid 160 $5 million to over the work that they did that they earned. but you tell me, maybe i'm nuts. maybe i'm the crazy one. >> crazy, or at least crazy enough to threaten to quit the job he just started if the bonuses were not awarded. you threatened to quit, didn't you? >> what i said is that i would announce my retirement in april of 201

. ♪ wil >> compared to other wall street titans like jamie dimon, bob benmosche is less recognizable, you couldn't tell on the streets of old dubrovnik, where people came up to the ceo to take photos. >> iem really nobody. am really nobody. >> he recalled the first time he took on the job with aig. when you first got your hands on the books, what was going on in the company? what did you see? >> i did not look in the books. i had a good idea of what was represented by what was in the books. because i spend a lot of time with jim milstein. jim was the restructuring executive who was handling this for the u.s. treasury. and i spend a lot of time with sarah dahlgren, who was also handling it for the new york fed. they told me about the financials. i questioned them about the financials. and my assumption was that they did their due diligence. >> when they briefed you on what was going on at aig and what they knew, were they better or worse than you thought? >> the world thought they were worse than they were. >> you did not? >> i didn't think it was that bad. but it is a question of, if

. >> i will be chatting with retired chief executive bob benmosche.veled to spend time with this retired wall street titan where he owns a vineyard. >> we have a ways to go. >> and recounts how he turned around a company left for dead. >> i had a company with a value of zero. today it is almost $80 billion. >> all while dealing with a personal struggle.

i will be shutting with an -- bob benmosche, former chief executive of aig.veled through croatia to spend time with this retired it tighten. when you come here to you instantly relax? >> at his vineyard. he recounts how he turns around the company left four dead. >> you thought i had a company worth zero dollars. >> all dealing with a very personal struggle. >> they told me i had nine months or a year to live. i said i have an obligation to resign if i cannot handle the chemotherapy.

in our sit down, i asked bob in benmosche about some of the dealings that went down with the governmentou did a lot of things -- can i name some of them? you said you had bigger balls than the government. >> that was in a private meeting. let me give you the context. you have to have context. we were about seven people or eight people, so i know who leaked it because he did another leak about a month later -- aig?thin >> within aig, who had a self interest in his position, and ok. everybody has self interests. he got into an argument with me and said you can't say these things and demand of us the performance you are demanding because we have the government to deal with, and the government is setting the rules and regulations. i said no, they are not. we are setting the rules and regulations. we are going to run this company, and i'm not worried about it. they can come after us. i said i know they can come after us. i know they think they have a lot of balls star the fact is, i not worried about the size of mine, and i will tell you the government is going to tell me how to run is comin

. >> i will be chatting with retired chief executive bob benmosche.d to spend time with this retired wall street titan where he owns a vineyard. >> we have a ways to go. >> and recounts how he turned around a company left for dead. >> i had a company with a value of zero. today it is almost $80 billion.

i will be shutting with an -- bob benmosche, former chief executive of aig.through croatia to spend time with this retired it tighten. when you come here to you instantly relax? >> at his vineyard. he recounts how he turns around the company left four dead. >> you thought i had a company orth zero dollars. today the marketting value of

you can catch my exclusive interview with bob benmosche. that's go to bloomberg.com/video and search titans at the table. skipper.ident john he and turner broadcasting have agreed to a new deal to show nba games. it is three times what the network is paying now. still, no one believes espn will go broke showing the nba games. cable operators pay espn more than any other network. i asked john skipper whether the time would ever be spun out from disney. >> it categorically would not. everybody should remember that espn has been built after disney bought it. most of the platforms we have started started with disney cash and with disney resources. the brands are very complementary. it is all about content, integrity, adoption of technology. the viewers as fans. we don't have issues between the parent company and these -- >> bob, skipper is referring to his boss, bob iger. at the players need to see a big chunk of that change. plus, shaking up the mortgage industry, a new lender has already done it through student loans. can it do the same for r

bob benmosche a would vehemently disagree with you.by far we have taken care of too big to fail and he said regulators have succeeded. >> i don't think another aig will happen. >> we will not see that crisis again? >> no, and we have been in this position for over two years for it i don't think you will see a bank failure that we have seen. i don't think you'll see securities industry failure like bear stearns or lehman. i give a thumbs up to the regulators for getting the job done and i give them a thumbs down for not telling the public. >> this is a guy who was in the trenches. why would you doubt him? >> let's be clear -- we are miles away from where we were in 2008. many things have gotten a lot better. failandful of too big to banks -- there is just under 7000 banks in the united states and this attention is focused on less than it does in that are too big to fail. they are in much better shape today. the question is whether or not reform will continue and that the safeguards that are put in place will stay and most importantly, w