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Blumner: The shame of hedge fund masterminds
http://www.tampabay.com/opinion/columns/blumner-the-shame-of-hedge-fund-masterminds/2116215Excerpts from article in St. Pete Times.
"Take Steven Cohen of SAC Capital Advisors. Cohen's 2012 pay was $1.4 billion. For this, he obtained a 13 percent return for investors. Sounds good, right? Except that the Standard & Poor's 500 stock index shot up 16 percent last year when factoring in dividends. SAC investors paid a 50 percent performance fee to Cohen despite the lagging numbers.
Having no shame is one of the rules for success as a hedge fund manager.
There are other rules, too, such as: "Don't ever get into the business of making things. Your job is to take money away from people who make things." The rules are entertainingly spelled out in How to Make a Million Dollars an Hour by Les Leopold, a book that carries the ominous subtitle, "Why Hedge Funds Get Away with Siphoning Off America's Wealth." As fun as this book is to read, its message is no laughing matter."
