How Jim Simons Built the Best Hedge Fund Ever

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On a related note and maybe mildly interesting is that Squarepoint does the same thing. All the juicy high turnover/sharpe strategies go into the main partner fund and the funds for investors get all the crap.

No surprising, why not to collect 2 percent risk free. It adds up over the years if AUM is big.
 
Yeah, definitely, but that's to be expected since for example REIF if I recall correctly is long only and marketed as a means to outperform the S&P 500, whereas Medallion is market neutral and trying to achieve high absolute returns and not just relative to a benchmark

On a related note and maybe mildly interesting is that Squarepoint does the same thing. All the juicy high turnover/sharpe strategies go into the main partner fund and the funds for investors get all the crap.

While generally true about REIF, I wasn't aware thatn Medallion was market neutral? Can you confirm that anywhere? I thought it was just absolute return not necessarily market neutral.

Please correct if I'm mistaken.
 
While generally true about REIF, I wasn't aware thatn Medallion was market neutral? Can you confirm that anywhere? I thought it was just absolute return not necessarily market neutral.

Please correct if I'm mistaken.

My understanding is that the equity book is market neutral based on conversations I've had with people in the industry over the years. The only 'hard' evidence is that Alexander Belopolsky ran an equity market neutral book at Millennium when he left rentec and continued when he started Enlightenment. Outside of equities I have no idea what they do.

I'd be very surprised if they run a significant long/short equity book but I don't work there so maaaybe.. but now that I think of it I don't know of any quants that run long/short overnight actually.. easier to model things in residual space and so makes sense to trade that way
 
"The Man Who Solved the Market" is filled with other fascinating characters, perhaps none more consequential -- to both Renaissance and the nation -- than former Chief Executive Officer Robert Mercer. It is a far more nuanced portrait of the conservative influencer than the ones usually found in the popular press. Mercer is a preternaturally calm and measured scientist, brilliantly rigorous and evidence-based in all things market-related. Yet outside of mathematics, he believes the wildest unfounded conspiracy theories, and buys into all manner of debunked nonsense. It is as if Mercer is an extreme version of everyone’s best and worst selves -- a brilliant and rational professional, but driven by biases and seething emotions in his political life.

Many conspiracy theories turned out to be true. I think Mercer did not believe something without any grounds. He knows how the MSM and people in power will try to 'debunk' something for their own benefit.
 
The return isn’t compounded. Medallion returns capital each year to keep the AUM down.

100bn in dollar profits on (say an average of 6bn) over 30 years is insane.

Bridgewater has earned about that in dollar profits but they needed a lot more AUM.
 
By paying his team so obscene it made no point for them to branch out on their own, I assume.
I get it, but still. Humans are greedy. It wouldn't take many leaks - e.g. an employee in the know instructing a couple of ph.d. friends - to start watering down the performance.

But I guess the track record is a testament that this has not happened to a significant extent. By itself impressive.
 
I get it, but still. Humans are greedy. It wouldn't take many leaks - e.g. an employee in the know instructing a couple of ph.d. friends - to start watering down the performance.

But I guess the track record is a testament that this has not happened to a significant extent. By itself impressive.

Correct, I heard only of one thing that leaked when few of the Russian colleagues left and there was some law suit, do not recall details, read about years ago. Some of their models holding time was between 15 min to few hours.

Another way to decipher a bit is what kind of jobs they post on their very "outdated" site. For example, couple of years they needed a quaint with specific tax knowledge, pay was specified as obscene. :). So part of success is how they avoid paying a penny more than they are required by law.
 
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