Top 25 Highest-Earning Hedge Fund Managers 2008

http://iimagazine.com/Alpha/Article.aspx?ArticleID=2165638

Times may be tough for most folks, but not for the top moneymakers on Alpha magazine’s eighth annual ranking of the world’s highest-earning hedge fund managers. They took home, on average, an anything but average $464 million apiece in 2008. Four hedge fund managers took home more than $1 billion each. Altogether the 25 highest-earning hedge fund managers made $11.6 billion, making 2008 the third-best year on record since Alpha began compiling its exclusive ranking.

Alpha uses two components to calculate earnings: the managers’ shares of their firm’s performance and management fees, as well as gains on their own capital invested in their funds.

The index below is a guide to the profiles of this year’s top-earning managers. Click on the bolded names below to read the top 11 hedge fund managers' profiles.

Rank Name Firm Name 2008 Earnings
1 James Simons Renaissance Technologies Corp. $2.5 billion
2 John Paulson Paulson & Co. $2 billion
3 John Arnold Centaurus Energy $1.5 billion
4 George Soros Soros Fund Management $1.1 billion
5 Raymond Dalio Bridgewater Associates $780 million
6 Bruce Kovner Caxton Associates $640 million
7 David Shaw D.E. Shaw & Co. $275 million
8 Stanley Druckenmiller Duquesne Capital Management $260 million
9 (tie) David Harding Winton Capital Management $250 million
9 (tie) Alan Howard Brevan Howard Asset Management $250 million
9 (tie) John Taylor Jr. FX Concepts $250 million


Next 12 - 25

To read the article, click on Brother, Can You Spare a Billion?

 

Mr Simons was up 80% net fees which equals 160% before. Only God and Simons know the actual amount of money he made. I wouldn't doubt if he made double the amount that's reported. The entire fund is made up of his own money. The fund is atleast $7 billion in size.

 

Any ideas on John Arnold's strategy? I understand that Centaurus, his Hedge fund, specializes in the energy sector (particularly natural gas). I understand that he's been averaging 100% - 300% annual returns each year for the last 6 years in the futures market. It was reported that in 2008 he made an 80% return on about $2 billion.

Walt

 

http://www.iimagazine.com/Alpha/Article.aspx?ArticleID=2165643

3 John Arnold
Centaurus Energy
$1.5 Billion

Energy trading wunderkind John Arnold surged toward the top of this year’s list of biggest earners on the 80 percent return at his Houston-based hedge fund, Centaurus Energy. The former Enron Corp. trader, who manages $5 billion in assets, deals mostly in natural gas, using futures and other derivatives. But he’s also known for his energy-related diversification. His firm has stakes in storage facilities and power plants, and last year it teamed up with Washington-based buyout firm Carlyle Group and Westport, Connecticut–based NGS Energy Fund to develop natural-gas storage caverns. In 2008, Centaurus opened an office in London as a way into European energy markets.

Arnold, 34, has been on a steep upward trajectory since graduating in just three years from Vanderbilt University, where he earned an undergraduate degree in science, and then quickly becoming a star at Enron. He founded Centaurus in 2002 with $8 million.

 

thanks Rubibond... any info on John Arnold's trading strategy. Needless to say, a return of almost 25,000% in about 6 years is nothing less than absolutely phenomenal!!!!!

Walt

 

He is only 34???:eek:

 

i wish to be one of them, What type of background
you need to become Trader

 

Today you need to major in a hard science or math at the masters level to even be competitive. A few years back an MBA would have been suffice.

Quantitative skills are the key. God bless Jim Simmons.

 

yes, I think (not sure 100%) he trade mostly on the OTC and Physical markets.

 

I wonder what his username is here on ET? I'll start searching the Energy forum to see if I can figure out which one he is