The Man Who Solved the Market: How Jim Simons Launched the Quant Revolution SHORTLISTED FOR THE FT & MCKINSEY BUSINESS BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD 2019 - Hardcover

Zuckerman, Gregory

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0241422159 ISBN 13: 9780241422151

Publisher: Portfolio Penguin, 2019

Synopsis

SHORTLISTED FOR THE FT AND MCKINSEY BUSINESS BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD 2019

'Reads more like a delicious page-turning novel...Put it on your holiday gift list for your favourite hedge-fund honcho' Bloomberg

'A compelling read' Economist

'Captivating' New York Times book review

Jim Simons is the greatest moneymaker in modern financial history. His record bests those of legendary investors, including Warren Buffett, George Soros and Ray Dalio. Yet Simons and his strategies are shrouded in mystery. The financial industry has long craved a look inside Simons's secretive hedge fund, Renaissance Technologies and veteran Wall Street Journal reporter Gregory Zuckerman delivers the goods.

After a legendary career as a mathematician and a stint breaking Soviet codes, Simons set out to conquer financial markets with a radical approach. Simons hired physicists, mathematicians and computer scientists - most of whom knew little about finance - to amass piles of data and build algorithms hunting for the deeply hidden patterns in global markets. Experts scoffed, but Simons and his colleagues became some of the richest in the world, their strategy of creating mathematical models and crunching data embraced by almost every industry today.

As Renaissance became a major player in the financial world, its executives began exerting influence on other areas. Simons became a major force in scientific research, education and Democratic politics, funding Hilary Clinton's presidential campaign. While senior executive Robert Mercer is more responsible than anyone else for the Trump presidency - he placed Steve Bannon in the campaign, funded Trump's victorious 2016 effort and backed alt-right publication Breitbart. Mercer also impacted the success of the Brexit campaign as he made significant investments in Cambridge Anatlytica. For all his prescience, Simons failed to anticipate how Mercer's activity would impact his firm and the world.

In this fast-paced narrative, Zuckerman examines how Simons launched a quantitative revolution on Wall Street, and reveals the impact that Simons, the quiet billionaire king of the quants, has had on worlds well beyond finance.

About this title

Review

So compelling, filled with so many fascinating characters and new information... The book reads more like a delicious page-turning novel... Destined to become an instant classic...my nominee for financial book of the year (Barry Ritholtz, Bloomberg)

A terrific book, a terrific read... I recommend it highly... It's a hell of a story (Lou Dobbs, Tonight, Fox News)

Tells a surprisingly captivating story. It turns out that a firm like Renaissance, filled with nerdy academics trying to solve the market's secrets, is way more interesting than your typical greed-is-good hedge fund (Joe Nocera, New York Times)

Gregory Zuckerman lifts the lid on the most fascinating man in financial markets...superb reporting (Robin Wigglesworth, Financial Times)

Zuckerman brings the reader so close to the firm's inner workings that you can almost catch a whiff of the billionaire's Merit cigarette (Brandon Kochkodin, Bloomberg)

A gripping biography of investment game changer Jim Simons... readers looking to understand how the economy got where it is should eat this up (Publishers Weekly)

Worthwhile reading for budding plutocrats and numerate investors alike (Kirkus)

Zuckerman vividly tells the story of how Jim Simons and his team of scientists developed the most successful quantitative trading operation in history. . . . Immensely enjoyable (Edward O. Thorp, author of A Man for All Markets)

An extremely well-written and engaging book . . . a must read, and a fun one at that (Mohamed A. El-Erian, author of The Only Game in Town)

Leave it to the Wall Street Journal's Greg Zuckerman to lay open the golden mysteries of quantitative investing. With this fine, humane, and eye-opening book, he's well and truly broken the code (James Grant, Grant’s Interest Rate Observer)

About the Author

Gregory Zuckerman is a special writer at the Wall Street Journal. He writes about big financial trades, hedge funds, private-equity firms and other investing and business topics. He's a three-time winner of the Gerald Loeb Award, the highest honour in business journalism. Zuckerman
is the author of The Greatest Trade Ever and The Frackers, and he appears regularly on CNBC, Fox Business and other networks around the world. He lives in New York.

About this edition

• Publisher: Portfolio Penguin
• Publication date: 2019
• ISBN 10: 0241422159
• ISBN 13: 9780241422151
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 384