At 40, Jim Simons left a famed math career to launch the most successful hedge fund ever: Renaissance Tech.

Even though it only won 51% of trades, the fund made 66%/yr for 30yrs (Simons worth = $25B). It's a story of genius, but also of how hard it is to beat markets.

THREAD🧵

1/ The crown jewel of RenTech is The Medallion Fund (launched in 1988).

◻️ From 1988-2018, it posted a return of 66%/yr (39% after fees)
◻️$1 invested in 1988 is now worth $14m+
◻️ Cumulative profit = $100B+ even with an avg. fund size of only $4.5B

2/ Before creating what Bloomberg calls the “greatest money-making machine ever”, Simons was a legendary mathematician.

3/ While at Stony Brook, Simons started trading commodities (with money staked by former MIT classmates).

The side investing was good enough that Simons -- also going through a divorce -- decided to leave academia and launch his own money management firm in 1978: Monemetrics.

4/ At the time, there were 2 main investment approaches:

◻️ Fundamental (understanding and forecasting an asset based on key drivers)
◻️ Technical analysis (studying price charts)

Simons’ strategy was to place a “fundamental lens” on currencies (eg. supply and demand).