Nancy Peretsman

Who

Peretsman is a managing director at Allen & Company and one of the most powerful women in finance. Put another way: She's Oprah's investment banker.

Backstory

The daughter of a New Jersey psychotherapist, Peretsman fills a very similar role as a leading investment banker. The difference: Her clients are notoriously difficult media moguls and their problems are business-related, although their issues are probably just as tied to ego. Prior to joining Allen & Company in the mid-1990s, Peretsman worked at Salomon Brothers from 1983 to 1995. Since arriving at Herbert Allen's media-focused boutique, she's largely followed the tide, working with cable companies on convergence deals when the sector was hot, helping dotcoms during the internet bubble, and advising tech giants and media behemoths.

Of note

Over the course of her career, Peretsman has worked on a slew of high-profile media transactions: She helped broker Viacom's purchase of BET, Vivendi-Universal's acquisition of Barry Diller's USA Network; and the sale of MediaOne to AT&T. A friend of Google CEO Eric Schmidt since they attended Princeton together, Peretsman advised Google on its 2004 IPO and also helped broker Google's $1 billion purchase of a 5 percent stake in AOL. She also happens to be the only investment banker who Oprah Winfrey has ever worked with, negotiating Winfrey's investment in Oxygen and then working with the company's CEO, Gerry Laybourne, on the sale of Oxygen to NBC for $925 million in 2007. Her biggest recent deal: She advised Rupert Murdoch on his $5 billion acquisition of Dow Jones, the publisher of the Wall Street Journal.

Board game

Peretsman serves on the board of the discount ticketer Priceline.com. The vice chairman of the board of the Bob Kerrey-led New School, she's also a trustee of Princeton, along with Tony Evnin and Charlie Gibson.

Personal

Peretsman is married to investment banker Bob Scully, formerly the co-president of Morgan Stanley. They live on East 79th Street.