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Today’s show is our third in the Training Grounds mini-series, following Carnegie Corporation and Bain Capital to better understand how certain organizations have developed industry leaders.
Wellington Management is one of the world’s largest, privately held asset managers, managing over $1.3 trillion in assets with 875 investment professionals across 19 offices and a nearly 100 year history with an unusually low level of turnover along the way. Wellington has developed, recruited, and retained leading global investment talent across public equities, fixed income, and recently private markets as well.
My guest to discuss this training ground is Jean Hynes, CEO of Wellington, who has spent more than thirty years at the firm starting as an administrative assistant. Our conversation covers Wellington’s cultural values and boutique investment team model, including apprenticeship for junior talent, recruiting at the mid-level, and promotion all the way to partner. We then discuss Wellington’s evolution from a U.S. equity value shop to a global, multi-asset, multi-strategy powerhouse, and Jean’s evolution from a portfolio manager to CEO.Take Capital Allocators Audience Engagement Survey
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Eric Peters leads both One River Asset Management and Coinbase Asset Management and writes a widely dispersed blog called Wknd Notes, in which he shares macro insights. He’s twice been a guest on the show, discussing his bespoke macro investment strategy four years ago and the case for Bitcoin three years ago. Both conversations are replayed in the feed.
Since then, many of One River’s strategies played out well during Covid, and Coinbase acquired One River Digital Asset Management in March 2023. We got back together to discuss how Eric has adapted to the changing environment, including One River’s shift from bespoke offerings to a total portfolio solution and the continued case for Bitcoin. Along the way, Eric shares his keen insights on portfolio construction, left-tail risks, and right-tail opportunities.
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Eric Peters is the founder and CIO One River Asset Management, where he searches for high conviction strategies coming out of his team’s expertise trading and investing in thematic macro, volatility, systematic, and inflation strategies – each as it turns out, turned his focus on study bitcoin and cryptocurrencies. Eric made news in November when he executed a $600 million purchase of bitcoin, then the largest public transaction to date. He has called bitcoin the most interesting macro trade he’s seen in thirty years in the business, and we kick off this mini series, Crypto for Institutions with his macro case for the digital asset. Our conversation discusses the intrigue of Bitcoin as a form of money, how digital currencies will somewhat ironically increase the power of governments and the likely co-existence of bitcoin with government digital currencies in the future. The then turn to the development of institutional infrastructure for digital assets, Eric’s perspective on bitcoin as an investor and a trader, the reflexive nature of bitcoin supply, and the risks in the asset. Lastly, we discuss the story of Eric’s big trade, the future of bitcoin, and institutional interest in the space. Please enjoy my conversation with Eric Peters in this first of four episodes in the mini-series Crypto for Institutions. Learn More
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Eric Peters is the founder and CIO One River Asset Management, an investment manager dedicated to delivering high conviction absolute-return strategies, where each individual strategy comes out of the team’s expertise in thematic macro, volatility, systematic, and inflation trading/investing. Eric has been a long-time trader and writes a widely dispersed email called Weekend Notes, in which he shares macro insights through colorful anecdotes.
Our conversation starts with Eric’s early exposure to trading, macro blow-ups, and the formation and activities of One River. We then turn to the current environment and get his sobering thoughts on what has transpired and what the turmoil will mean for private equity and asset allocation going forward.
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Consolidation in asset management is one of the industry's most important trends. When any industry enters a mature phase, consolidation brings the benefits of economies of scale, product depth, and broader services to meet client demands. We’ve seen a rising tide of merger activity in recent years, effecting both asset managers and allocators alike.
My guests on today’s show are leaders of two organizations that announced mergers in October – Simon Krinsky, a Managing Partner at Hall Capital and Tim McCusker, CIO at NEPC. Hall announced a merger with Pathstone, adding its $45 billion in assets to Pathstone’s $100 billion. NEPC announced a sale of a majority stake in its firm to Hightower Holdings, adding NEPC’s $1.8 trillion of assets under advisement to Hightower’s $130 billion of assets under management. Both Hall and NEPC have been longstanding independent organizations that are selling to a partner backed by private equity owners.
Simon and Tim walk through their rationale for the transactions, deal process from idea to signing, and opportunities and challenges going forward. The organizations share similarities in their long independent history, broad equity ownership, and investment capability, while also having significant differences in their new partners, incentive structure, and plan to service clients. Together, Simon and Tim offer an inside look at dealmaking in asset management.Take Capital Allocators Audience Engagement Survey
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Chris Heller is the Co-Founder of Cordillera Investment Partners, a $1.6 billion manager of non-correlated, niche investments, or weird alternatives. Cordillera looks for investments ahead of the crowd that offer compelling returns and significant diversification. Chris came on the podcast two years ago in our Manager Meeting series interviewed by FEG’s Greg Dowling, and that conversation is replayed in the feed.
Our follow-up covers lessons learned over ten years of focusing on off-the-run investments. We reflect on Cordillera’s strategy, sourcing funnel, research, operating partners, deal structures, and risk management. We then discuss the importance of people, humility, and struggle in investment success. Along the way, Chris colors his lessons with examples from specialty financing of whiskey, boat marinas, wireless spectrum, land for data centers, sports, and cheese.Take Capital Allocators Audience Engagement Survey
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On today’s Manager Meeting, Greg Dowling interviews Chris Heller. Greg is the Co-CIO and Head of Research for Fund Evaluation Group, an institutional OCIO and investment consultant with $83 billion in assets under advisement. Chris is Co-Founder and Co-Managing Partner at Cordillera Investment Partners, a $1.2 billion alternative investment fund that invests in niche, non-correlated assets, or what Chris calls weird stuff, like whiskey aging, boat marinas, spectrum, and water rights. Their conversation covers Chris’s background and the founding of Cordillera, the evolution of alternative assets and alternative alternatives, sourcing new opportunities, conducting due diligence, measuring risk, portfolio construction, and exit strategy.
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Matt Bank is the Deputy Chief Investment Officer at GEM, an OCIO that manages $12 billion for forty clients. GEM was founded in 2007 by investment leaders at The Duke Endowment and Duke University Investment Management Company.
Our conversation covers Matt’s path to investing under recent guest David Salem and lessons learned about risk and governance while under his tutelage. We then turn to Matt’s move to GEM and its positioning in the OCIO industry. We cover GEM’s approach to asset allocation and manager selection, and close with Matt’s thoughts on active and passive investing, venture capital, hedge funds, and drivers of success going forward.Take Capital Allocators Audience Engagement Survey
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Jeff Glass is the Cofounder and CEO of Hometap Equity Partners, a novel platform with $1 billion of investments alongside a mission to allow homeowners to access their home equity without having to sell, stress, or borrow. Jeff started the business eight years ago after a series of successes as an entrepreneur followed by seven years investing at Bain Capital Ventures.
Our conversation covers Jeff’s early lessons in sales, entrepreneurship, and investing that led to the founding of Hometap. We then discuss Hometap’s investment strategy, including the chicken-and-egg problem of starting the business, sourcing homeowners, sourcing capital, and developing the team, culture, and infrastructure that brings it all together.
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Jon Glidden is the CIO of Delta Air Lines, where he oversees the company’s $16 billion pension fund. Jon joined Delta in 2011, when the plan had $7.5 billion in assets, a $13 billion underfunded liability, and the highest actuarial expected rate of return (9%) of any company in the S&P 500. Despite funded status that threatened the solvency of the company thirteen years ago, investment performance combined with corporate contributions that offset plan payouts have improved Delta’s funding status from 42% to 102% today, creating the largest corporate pension turnaround in history.
Our conversation discusses Jon’s independent thinking and innovative approach that led to his incredible feat. We start with his Naval and investment background and then cover the four forces that drive his investment philosophy - portable alpha, private equity, portfolio construction, and governance - and the implementation of each.Take Capital Allocators Audience Engagement Survey
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Chris and Rob Michalik are twin brothers and co-founders of Kinderhook Industries, a middle-market private equity firm overseeing $8 billion focused on healthcare services, environmental services, and the automotive aftermarket. Chris and Rob joined me on Private Equity Deals to discuss one of their portfolio companies, Ironclad Environmental Services, and that conversation is replayed in the feed.
This time around, we discuss their story attached at the hip. We cover their background and path to starting Kinderhook, including rooming together for the first 26 years of their lives. We discuss the firm's family-like culture, three pillars of its investment approach, unwarranted scrutiny of private equity in the healthcare sector, and the recent example of their purchase of Stewardship Medical Group out of the bankrupt Steward Healthcare.Take Capital Allocators Audience Engagement Survey
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On episode eight of season three of Private Equity Deals, Chris and Rob Michalik discuss Kinderhook Industries’ investment in Ironclad Environmental Services.
Chris and Rob are twin brothers and co-founders of Kinderhook, a twenty-year-old private equity firm that manages $5 billion specializing in middle-market businesses across healthcare services, environmental services, and automotive/light manufacturing.
Ironclad Environmental Services is a leading provider of logistics-based solutions focused on the containment of industrial waste. It has 50 branches and a fleet of 29,000 specialized rental assets that store, separate, and transport liquid and solid industrial waste.
Our conversation covers Kinderhook’s identification, due diligence, and negotiation of the deal. We discuss a significant early add-on acquisition, progress-to-date, and the future of Ironclad.
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Scott Bessent is the CEO and CIO of Key Square Group and a renowned global macro investor. His 40-year investment career has included two stints at Soros Fund Management, the first for a decade under Stan Druckenmiller and the second for five as CIO. In between, Scott launched a hedge fund, retired, and joined me at Protégé Partners when he learned retirement wasn’t for him.
Following his second tour at Soros, Scott started Key Square with $4.5 billion, one of the largest hedge fund launches in history. Scott has been profiled in two best-selling investment books, Steve Drobny’s Inside the House of Money and Sebastian Mallaby’s More Money than God.
Our conversation covers Scott’s investment path learning research from Jim Rogers, short selling from Jim Chanos, global macro investing from George Soros and Stan Druckenmiller, and twice hanging his own shingle. We discuss high-conviction ideas, asymmetric asset selection, position sizing, risk management, a hub and spoke approach, and core challenges of the global macro hedge fund business.
I once told Scott that he could read the newspaper six months ahead of time because I had never encountered someone with his ability to connect dots and imagine investments others had not considered. His interest in improving the country’s economic picture has led him to shed his publicity-shy nature, and I’m grateful for the opportunity to share his story.
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Ricky Sandler is one of the OGs of fundamental long-short equity investing. Ricky started managing a hedge fund thirty years ago and founded Eminence Capital a few years later. Today, he is the CEO and CIO at Eminence, where he oversees $7 billion across long-short, long-only, and long-extension strategies.
Our conversation covers Ricky’s path to launching Eminence in his twenties and the evolution of long-short investing in the decades since. We dive into Eminence's culture, adaptation in the investment process, and creation of investment products to meet the needs of allocators, each of which has been an essential part of the firm’s ability to survive and thrive amid changing market dynamics.
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The Yale Investments Office will soon select its first round of Prospect Fellowship recipients. I’ve been thinking about why Yale launched the Fellowship and what might happen as it rolls out. Yale, emerging managers, and other allocators have opportunities and risks arising from the program, including some potential unintended consequences.
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Brad Briner is the leading candidate for the Treasurer of North Carolina in the upcoming November election, a role that includes managing the state’s $115 billion pension fund. Brad put himself in the ring for the seat after twenty-five years of investment experience, serving most recently as Co-CIO of Willett Advisors, Michael Bloomberg’s family office. For more background on Willett, my conversation from 2019 with Chairman Steve Rattner is replayed in the feed.
I don’t often get to talk about really poor investment performance on the podcast, but this time we do. North Carolina has finished dead last among peers over the last three and five years, that’s 50th of 50 states. Its twenty-year returns are almost equally dismal. This significant underperformance resulted from an overlay conservative asset allocation that will leave you shaking your head. Unfortunately, it’s what happens when unsophisticated professionals are tasked with serious investment jobs.
Our conversation covers Brad’s story, investment and leadership insights from his experience and time at Willett, the problems with North Carolina’s investing and governance, and Brad’s desire and plan to turn around the state’s pension performance.
I’ve known Brad for ten years and want to do everything I can to help him both win the important seat and succeed once there. So if you happen to live in North Carolina, please get out and vote – every vote truly counts in low turnout races like thisIf, like most of us, you don’t live there, please tell any friends you have who do live in the state. Lastly, if Brad is successful at the polls, he’ll need to build out a team with talented professionals who share his passion for investing and making a difference. Maybe you can help there too.
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Steve Rattner is the Chairman and CEO of Willett Advisors, which invests former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s personal and philanthropic assets. Steve’s career has ranged from a journalist for the New York Times to investment banking at Lehman Brothers, Morgan Stanley and Lazard Freres, to founding private equity firm Quadrangle Group, and lastly to serving in the Obama Administration as head of the successful restructure of the automobile industry after the financial crisis. He returned to oversee Willett Advisors after his work in the government.
Our conversations starts with a quick tour through each of Steve’s careers, and then turns to his work investing the assets of Michael Bloomberg’s family office, including selecting an investment model, building a team of specialists, using internal management to supplement external managers, and thinking through private equity, hedge funds, public equity, and the manager selection process. We close with Steve’s perspectives on China and his ongoing engagement in politics.
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Matt Miller is the Managing Director of Grey Rock Investment Partners. Matt co-founded Grey Rock as a traditional oil and gas manager in 2013. Today, the firm manages $1 billion across both natural resources and renewables by identifying attractive niches in each that do not tradeoff human interest for returns.
Our conversation covers Matt’s path to the energy sector and founding of Grey Rock, the ongoing need for natural resources, and the identification of dislocations that create niche opportunities. We turn to Grey Rock’s own ‘energy transition’ intended to resolve ESG pressures while meeting client return objectives, including the overcapitalization of most renewable strategies, discovery of an attractive niche in carbon capture, and complexity in making it work.Learn More
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Kristof Gleich is the President and CIO of Harbor Capital Advisors. Harbor is a forty-year old firm that manages $62 billion by partnering with boutique active managers to roll out active ETFs, collective investment trusts, and historically, mutual funds.
Kristof joined Harbor in 2018 and watched as the actively managed mutual fund company had $22 billion of outflows, or a third of its assets, in his first year on the job. He led a turnaround of the business to transition from a traditional mutual fund company to an innovative leader in the active ETF space.
Our conversation covers the lessons Kristof learned about culture from his time at Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan, and his application of those lessons to turnaround Harbor. We discuss the challenges of making it happen, the rise of active ETFs, Harbor’s approach to standing out in a crowded field, its manager selection process, distribution, and the future of alternative investments in the ETF space.Learn More
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Dan Ariely is a leading behavioral economist, author, entrepreneur and the James B. Duke Professor of Psychology and Behavioral Economics at Duke University. Dan is a founding partner of Irrational Capital, an investment research firm that quantifies the impact of corporate culture and employee motivation on financial performance. My initial conversation with Dan two years ago has been one of the most downloaded episodes of the show, and a recent research piece by JP Morgan entitled The Human Capital Factor that highlights his work got me excited to catch up with him again. Our conversation covers many aspects of his continuing research to identify positive human capital practices and performance in the workplace, including data collection and assessment, gender differences, goodwill, ESG, and changes during Covid. We then turn to the practical application of the research in the capital markets through two indexes and customized research. We close by talking about Dan’s new research projects and some of his favorite recent answers to his Ask Ariely column in the WSJ. Learn More
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