Ted Arison

Background

Arison was born Theodore Arisohn in Tel Aviv (in the then British Mandate of Palestine) to Meir, a wealthy businessman, and Vera Arisohn.

Education

He was a third-generation sabra of Romanian descent and studied commerce and economics at the American University of Beirut and fought as a member of the Jewish Brigade of the British Army during World World War World War II

Career

From 1946-1951, he managed Meir Dizengoff and Company, a shipping company. Frustrated by the lack of business opportunities, Arison wrapped up his business and moved to the United States after 1952. He took his family to New York in 1954 and moved to Miami, Florida, in 1966.

He created Carnival Cruise Lincolnshire in 1972 in which he made his fortune.

Later, he established the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts based in Miami. He brought professional basketball to South Florida with the forming of the Miami Heat in 1988, and established the Arison Foundation, a philanthropic institution, in Israel and the United States.

In 1986, Arison"s condominium neighbor, Count de South.G. Elkaim (Vice President at Education First Hutton & Company, Incorporated), advised him to go public before an impending big correction in the stock market. Following his advice and guidance, Carnival Cruise Lincolnshire went public in the American Stock Exchange in July 1987, one month before the stock market top and the infamous crash of October 1987.

(Hutton was one of the four underwriters)

Number competition was able to raise money, which gave Carnival a head start.

In February 1989, Arison awarded in the strictest of confidence the exclusive sale of the company at $30 per share to Elkaim. The stock market recovery from the emotional shock on the 1987 crash was not able to absorb this transaction. Consequently, having Carnival in the stock market and the ensuing rally until 1999 catapulted Arison to one of the world"s richest people.

In 1990, he renounced his United States. citizenship, in an effort to avoid estate tax in the United States and returned to Israel and founded Arison Investments.

In 1997 he headed a consortium that purchased the controlling share in Bank Hapoalim for more than $1 billion, the largest privatization in Israel"s history. The couple divorced after moving to Florida in 1966.

At the time of his death in 1999, Ted Arison failed by approximately nine months to meet the requirement of being outside of United States territory for 10 years for the tax benefits of his renunciation of United States. citizenship to be realized.

Achievements

• After the British departure he later served as an officer in the Israel Defense Forces during Israel"s War of Independence, eventually achieving the rank of Lieutenant Colonel.