Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager - Consumerist Comments

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

Haltingpoint — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 13:52:05 EST

@darkened: I'm curious to know your definition of a dream job. Hedge fund managers have incredibly stressful work lives and work LONG hours. Yes, they could most likely retire in luxury after working for a year or two but those would be two VERY long years.

Haltingpoint

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

Smackdown — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 13:45:27 EST

What an amazing interview. Really outstanding.

Smackdown

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

redx — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 12:44:02 EST

If he doesnt know how mortgages are underwritten then he doesnt deserve to be a HFM. Managing other people's money is a very serious business.

redx

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

m4ximusprim3 — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 01:03:03 EST

@Ghede: so you're a percussionist then?

m4ximusprim3

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

Ghede — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 22:18:07 EST

So... The whole reason behind the investments and resulting collapse was a rating system that decided "Let's not use A as the highest, that is too scholastic, let us use triple-A." Sheesh. We have maestros running the orchestra that don't know the next note, and players who don't know what they are playing. The entire brass section is drunk and the percussionists have a nasty habit of overextending metaphors.

Ghede

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

shoegazer — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 18:36:10 EST

why are hedge fund managers so fascinating? they're not, generally speaking. But this guy they interviewed, definitely up there.

shoegazer

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

Prosumerist — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 18:13:07 EST

He works hard for the money! So hard honey honey!

Prosumerist

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

NotATool — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 17:20:17 EST

..and so we just ignored the elephant in the room and his 800-pound gorilla friend, because, hey, we were all making money. And Moody's said it was OK.

NotATool

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

artki — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 17:09:48 EST

Great interview. I'll point out that you can find stories like this in Adam Smith's "The Money Game" and "Super Money" which talk about stock wheeling and dealing in the 1960s.

Back then it was all TelStar and Student Loan Marketing*. Now it's CDOs.

*Before credit cards were popular. They got the idea to loan money to college students. What could possibly go wrong?

artki

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

m4ximusprim3 — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 16:57:52 EST

@El_Guapo: Agreed. Very good read.

And he makes an overlords joke- definitely a patron of the internets.

m4ximusprim3

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

JustAGuy2 — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 16:49:04 EST

@darkened:

But when would you have shorted them? If you felt the same way in 2006, you would have lost your shirt.

JustAGuy2

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

El_Guapo — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 16:40:26 EST

That was a fantastic article.

El_Guapo

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

kantwait — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 16:31:17 EST

Hedge fund managers are assholes (I've been close to 2 very profitable ones *ahem*). All they care about is money and they act like they're the end-all, be-all of the financial sector. The one hedge fund manager I dated for quite a while and he would make $10-20 million a year just in fees from clients. That's $$ he would get no matter how well the fund performed or didn't. It's ridiculous.

kantwait

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

rhombopteryx — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 16:24:51 EST

@savvy999:

And (even better) without actually performing better than any other Joe Blow in most cases, even. It's a dream situation - get a big salary (2% of assets/yr.) no matter how you perform, and then 20% of any appreciation IF inflation happens or you do happen to get lucky with your guesses.

rhombopteryx

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

darkened — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 16:20:09 EST

@savvy999: To me because they have a job I dream of. And I just like the person interviewed would've shorted the sub prime loans and made millions. Sadly I don't have millions to toss around in investments to do this for myself yet.

darkened

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

Dead Wrestlers Society — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 15:58:57 EST

Hey, it's the banker from Deal No Deal !

Dead Wrestlers Society

Interview With An Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager

savvy999 — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 15:53:32 EST

Why are hedge fund managers so fascinating?

Because they've figured out a way to make millions off of other people's money-- and at times, misery-- without an ounce of risk to themselves. They are the most brilliant of bookies.

savvy999