Preet Bharara Settles The Rumor About Him Being Independently Wealthy

A lot of things have been said about U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara - that he's Wall Street's fiercest cop, that he has a great sense of humor, that he has no interest in politics... etc.

For sure, he's a talented guy, and he could be making way more money in the private sector, but Bharara says he's happy where he is.

Rumor is that's because he's independently wealthy - at the New York Times' Dealbook conference today, reporter Peter Lattman asked him about that one.

The word on the Street, said Lattman, is that Bharara's little brother made $550,000,000 selling Diaper.com to Amazon during the dot com boom of the 90s, and that Preet was an early investor.

Bharara laughed at that, "well I'm not as independently wealthy as the people in this room," he said looking at the investors in the audience.

Now Bharara didn't say he wasn't an investor. He didn't say he made no money off the deal, but he said he's not rich.

To illustrate that point, he said that his little brother pays for dinner now. Bharara tried recently, but his brother repeated "no dude, I got it."

Two more things to know about this interview: Bharara did touch on his probe into SAC Capital, and reiterated that criminal charges are not off the table.

Also, Bharara had a great description of what he'd do after he leaves the Justice Department.

"I'll probably walk the earth like Caine in Kung Fu," he said.