Update June 28, 2012 Marketwatch.com: The dramatic credit-derivative loss, initially estimated by J.P. Morgan Chase at $2 billion, may balloon to as much as $9 billion, report says.
Boaz Weinstein on Bloomberg of Saba Capital Management
Takes Down the London Whale of JP Morgan
What are Hedge Funds and How Do They Work?
Age: 38
Executive Post: Founder of Saba Capital Management
Why he’s young and fierce: He ranked 17th on this year’s Fortune “40 under 40″ list, and was also named a rising hedge fund star of 2010 by Institutional Investor Magazine. According to the magazine, Weinstein was the youngest global co-head in Deutsche Bank history at just 27-years-old.
In 2008, the “star derivatives trader”–as deemed by the New York Times–left the German bank to run his own hedge fund, Saba Capital Management.
Since then, loyal investors have put more than $1.5 billion into Saba, which has yet to have a down month, reports Fortune. And so far this year, Weinstein is beating the credit fund average with returns near 9 percent.
Image Source: Saba Capital
Meet the Man Who Took Down JPMorgan
“BOAZ WEINSTEIN IS AN AGGRESSIVE TRADER WHO ONCE LOST $2B, TOO”
“(NEWSER) – Credit (or blame) Boaz Weinstein—a 38-year-old hedge fund trader known as a “monster” for his aggressive, risky style—for the $2 billion takedown of JPMorgan, reports the New York Times. Weinstein, a chess master and big-time Las Vegas gambler, isn’t talking, but numerous other traders say he is the one who noticed something amiss in the credit derivatives market last November, spotting a particular index trading out of line in a market it was supposed to track. Weinstein and his team at Saba Capital Management did not know JPMorgan and the trader Bruno Iksil were on the other side; all Weinstein knew was that the other side kept selling, so he kept buying.”“It was one whale versus another whale,” says a hedge fund manager. Iksil kept upping the sells, trying to scare off the other side, but Weinstein did not stop; soon the volume of trades was off the charts and all of London was buzzing. In February, Weinstein even named the JPMorgan fund as one to buy, further ramping up the pressure. Ironically, though, many think Weinstein learned from painful experience—he lost $1.8 billion for Deutsche Bank in 2008 at the height of the financial crisis. “If you hand me a list of the top-performing guys in the space, I’d expect to see his name on it,” says one bank exec. “If you hand me another list of hedge funds that might blow up, I’d expect his name to be on that, too.”
Quote Source: newser.com
