you know, last year, in July, when this whole shift in the market first began, RT got caught up in the volatility, on the wrong side. back then, the speed and volatility increases, relative to the market norm prior, must have 'taken then by surprise', in fact, the statement released by Simons stated just that, paraphrased: 'the market didn't behave as it shopuld have' instead of saying something like, 'we didn't see it coming', he said, essentially, the market isn't trading they way it should be, or that we expected it too. my point is this. the volatility recently, along with the magnitudes and speed of the moves, are even greater than last July (07), when they origianlly got nicked. perhaps, lightning may strike agin in the same place.
Interesting. I remember meeting Louis Bacon on several occasions ( his brother Zach managed some money for Soros at the time ) back in 1986 when I was working for one of his customers at the time . . . Louis was merely a commodity broker at Shearson at the time. Because of all of the "flow" that he was privy to, Shearson raised some money for him to trade with, and he did very well "piggy-backing" off of others and their ideas. That's how he got his start. But make no mistake, a VERY smart guy. A few years later, the next thing I hear is that he is trading from overseas and had 83 people working under him. Last November, he paid $175 million for the 171,000 acre Trinchera Ranch in Colorado, from the Forbes Family. Amazing story.
Some people seem to think that these big name guys like SAC and Citadel make money no matter what but that certainly isn't the case. They have good track records but believe me they get hit with these swings. SAC certainly didn't see this coming and their pnl took a huge hit last year. You need to remember that they aren't sitting their trading a few hundred million anymore. They have billions to move around and you just cannot be very nimble with that kind of scratch.
It seems to me most of these funds are too big for their own good! Why not cap it at $100M and enjoy the flexibiltiy? I am guessing maklnig 25% on $100M is a LOT easier than it would be with $1BN. Seems once you get above a certain number your returns are quite pathetic really. Greedy %£$%£'s