- ISBN13: 9781576602454
- Condition: USED – VERY GOOD
- Notes:
Product Description
One of Amazon.com’s Best Books of 2007
Top 10 Editor’s Picks: Finance and Investing
The hedge fund industry’s top managers have a penchant for high returns and low profiles. The combination makes them a regular focus of the media, eager to know what makes them tick. Now, thanks to Katherine Burton, who’s been covering these noteworthy traders for Bloomberg News for more than a decade, we know considerably more about them. With candor and detail, the industry’s most successful hedge fund managers describe the events that shaped their personal journeys, the strategies they use to produce returns even in uncooperative markets, and the attributes that make a smart investor. Hedge Hunters offers a r… More >>
Hedge Hunters: Hedge Fund Masters on the Rewards, the Risk, and the Reckoning
This is the sort of book that manages to conclude an entire examination of T. Boone Pickens without noting that he bankrolled the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Fair enough if we were compensated with some in-depth analysis of the subjects’ successes and failures instead of soft-light Barbara Walters-esque “gee, what makes you tick?” essays. The reader will search in vain for any such illumination.
It should be noted that much of our best journalism over the past six years has come from the business page–to the shame of political reporters. So the expectation that we might get some critical insight into the practices of hedge fund managers is not a vain one. Compare the recent article in the New Yorker on Harry Kat and hedge funds that questions the cozy two and twenty arrangements of the princelings. (It is available online, just search for it–Amazon seems to frown on links). Very disappointing. Rating: 3 / 5
I stopped reading this after I saw the cover where the author advertises that she is from bloomberg ‘news’… which in my personal experience is notoriously loose with facts.
In my view the author should de-emphasize her background at bberg ‘news’. Rating: 1 / 5
It is the best book on hedgies ever!
I cover a number of hedge funds, and this book is one of the best books ever written about the hedgies! Rating: 5 / 5
Having read Jack Schwager’s excellent Market Wizards and New Market Wizards years ago, my expectation was a contemporary work on the same level. This work is totally shallow and reflects the author’s lack of in depth knowledge of the world of hedge fund management and strategies. Except for the reach to Boone Pickens’ BP Capital, it seems that the author’s universe of contacts didn’t extend much beyond the convenient range of NYC. She also appears to think that commodity trading is something new to the hedge fund world and Pickens’ is some kind of pioneer in that area. Huh! Has she read Schwager’s classics? And what about some trading examples and insight as to what and how these managers actually produce Alpha. Someone else commented that if you’re in to in flight magazine type interviews which focus on human interest issues like what someone wears or what they like to do eat or drink or do in their spare time, this is your enlightenment. However if you’re into serious trading and making money, there’s nothing to be gained from this read. Rating: 2 / 5
This book is a list of 18 case studies of successful hedge fund managers. Unfortunately there are few common themes tying these stories together. According to Burton, the basic mechanics of money management can be taught, but that “special sauce” that really successful managers have can’t be, and this is what she attempts to uncover in this book.
Each of the fund managers interviewed talk about favorite “values” relating to risk-taking, hiring, using (or not using) leverage, etc, and about their historical strategies: how they chose markets, how they handled the dotcom bubble burst, their biggest successes and failures. But most of their stories are anecdotal, and focus a little too much on their “boy genius” beginnings. They don’t give any actual advice, nor do they disclose any current strategies. And why would they? This would likely jeopardize their current positions.
As a middle class worker with decent savings and an active interest in investing, I found this book a bit frustrating: no actionable investing advice is given, and while I really liked the style and strategy of some of the fund managers who were interviewed, I am not rich enough for investing with them to even be an option. Rating: 3 / 5