Surf- I think that you overestimate the costs involved. If your costs are that high, maybe you should look for a cheaper firm. For the year, with all costs (some that I could probably do without), I am going to spend about 100k on total expenses. I think that the biggest mistake you can make is to pay for capital. I have been offered dozens of deals, some where I only have to give away 5-10% of my fees and always said no. It may take me longer, but I intend to grow this thing organically and by word of mouth. I agree with you, you can play micro-cap world with a few hundred k's. You can't even bother once you hit 100m. That is part of the reason that you can keep finding companies with PE's of 5 with 30-50% annual earnings growth. There are just so many inefficientcies. I do not know when size will be an issue, but thus far, I have had no problems, and some of my positions are over 2% of a company's stock.
Go Harris go! great job ! you are truely an inspiration to wanna-be players (me included). the only downside is that you may not have the time to share your knowledge with fellow ET members the way you once did. I remember when the chat room first started up there were just a few of us in there (me,you nitro, kymar etc.) and you would call some GNP plays..some of which I took and made some $ on. Keep going! I'm sure soon we'll be reading about you in some indusrty publications.
You can already read about Harris: http://www.thestreet.com/markets/marketfeatures/771116.html His hedge fund isn't the first time he's done well trading.
Thanks Aaron..I've seen that before. And you too are an inspiration! I was checking out your online presentation on system testing. Good stuff. Keep up the good work. Now I must get back to dealing with this hangover. Why does a night of drinking do so much more damage once you pass 30 yrs of age?
Thanx for all your kind words guys. I do not go to the room any more just b/c most of what I do is longer term in nature now and I was wasting too much time explaining my rationale to every new guy who came in the room. I come in from time to time though. I still lurk around, but do not post as much for the same reason really. You know my main positions anyway. Long Gold stocks, long SMH PUTS (I have 900 puts now - Gosh!). Good luck guys.
Depends on investment objectives. A conservative fund that merely aims to add 200 basis points to Treasuries with non-existant D/D's may be able to raise billions. A fund like Aaron's, that has more extreme volatility will only be placed with partial allotments of capital by high net worth investers and advisers. Yet Aaron with lets say 20 million can net himself as much money with a 100% year as another manager can on a billion dollar fund that returns 10%. Ain't a lot of ultra high return 100 million funds around!