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The best quotes of 2010

December 21, 2010   Suzy Kenly Waite

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Managers who botched the BP spill, tangled with Obama and read their Kafka uttered some memorable comments in the pages of AR this year.


“Ken Griffin holds his investors somewhere between indifference and disdain.” —Investor’s comments on the hedge fund report card.

“Their fees are extremely high and their transparency is poor.” —An investor’s comments about Steve Cohen’s SAC Capital Advisors.

“We have felt like a piñata.” —Anthony Scaramucci, founder of fund of funds Skybridge Capital, to President Barack Obama.

“There’s this unprovable sense that the Obama administration and the Democrats are out to get them.” —Michael Boland, Dome Advisors, on the hedge funds’ shift to the right.

"It's a bitch to be old, but sometimes it is not so bad." —David Tepper, founder of Appaloosa Management, on how his experience in the distressed cycle of the 1990s paid off big time in 2009.

"I have no intentions to stop trading or retire in the next five years and plan to stay engaged as CIO for years to come." Paul Tudor Jones, in a statement to AR, addressing concerns about succession at Tudor Investment Corp.

“There is a price to pay for this endless amount of greed.” Oliver Stone on the Wall Street scandals post-2008.

“If you have extravagant office space, people might ask the question ‘Oh, this is what my money is going to?’” —Patrick Morris, HAGIN Investment Management, on the Manhattan hedge fund real estate market.

“When you win Wimbledon, you want to win it again.” —John Paulson, Paulson & Co., on continuing his success.

“The only way for an investor to justify a hedge fund allocation is through a belief that an individual manager’s selections will perform significantly better than the averages. There’s no other way.” Simon Lack, founder of SL Advisors and previously the founder of JPMorgan’s seeding platform, on how the hedge fund industry’s IRR has lagged even Treasury bills.

“I did not sell it well. I still think it’s a good company.” —Omega Advisors’ Leon Cooperman on BP after the disastrous oil spill in the Gulf in May.

“May 20 really hurt us. It was one of the worst days we’ve ever had.” —Michael Geismar of QIM. The firm’s Quantitative Global Program lost nearly 4% in one day.

“This is a tale straight out of Kafka.” —Plainfield’s Max Holmes describes his firm’s fight for survival following what he calls a smear campaign from two companies Plainfield lent money to before the crisis hit.

“I have been in the markets for 30 years and I have seen some really wild times. At times, we had to be like street dogs to survive.” Luis Stuhlberger, of Brazilian hedge fund Credit Suisse Hedging-Griffo, on his career in emerging markets.

“No one told you that clients would be screaming at you.” —Philippe Jabre of Jabre Capital Partners, on his peers who were paralyzed by the events of 2008.


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