Cantor Fitzgerald, the financial services firm that lost 658 employees in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, is giving back.
The company, in what has been a tradition, is donating to charity — including The Cantor Fitzgerald Relief Fund — all its global revenues from trading during the 22nd anniversary Monday.
The firm is hoping to raise $8-12 million.
Launched in 2002, Charity Day invites celebrities and other guests to join Cantor Fitzgerald’s licensed brokers on trading floors to conduct transactions and raise funds.
Among the celebrity ambassadors invited this year are Nicole Kidman and her husband Keith Urban, Charlize Theron, Patrick Dempsey, Matthew McConaughey, Regina Hall, and former President Bill Clinton.
The relief fund started immediately after 9/11 and has provided $180 million in direct aid and health benefits to families of its perished workers.
It has also donated nearly $380 million overall — including to 150 groups.
In recent years, millions of dollars has been earmarked for victims of natural disasters like hurricanes in Puerto Rico, victims of Super Storm Sandy in New York, tornadoes in Oklahoma and fires in California, said Edith “Edie” Lutnick, president and co-founder of the relief fund and the brother of CEO Howard Lutnick.
The success of the charitable group highlights the resiliency of Cantor Fitzgerald, which has emerged stronger after the devastating loss of personnel at Ground Zero.
Howard Lutnik — CEO before and after 9/11 — remains in charge.
The company’s headquarters was located on the top floors of the World Trade Center’s north tower that collapsed.
“We lost two-thirds of our workforce,” Edie Lutnick said.
Edie and Howard Lutnick also lost their younger brother, Gary, who worked for the firm and died in the attacks.
The firm accounted for about a quarter of those killed in the attack on the World Trade Center complex — more than any other entity, including the city Fire Department, which lost 343 responders.
“You’re never OK. You find a new normal,” Edie Lutnick said.
Howard Lutnick donated $1 million to the effort and asked his sister to run The Cantor Fitzgerald Relief Fund, which can be reached at www.cantorrelief.org.
“It’s the greatest accomplishment in my life,” she said of the charity fundraising.
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