Thursday, March 6, 2008

"Peloton says sorry for $2bn losses..."

but thanks for the fees you paid us last year!  According to the Financial Times, Peloton Partners, the formerly $2 bln, now worthless hedge fund, offered 7 reasons for its spectacularly swift decline.  It could have summed up nicely by telling investors to read "When Genius Failed", the book that gives the hilarious account of how Long Term Capital blew-out in 1998.  It's the same story, with slightly different details.  However, in what was called an emotional conference call, Ron Beller, co-founder, tried to score sympathy by sharing that staff and partners had invested $127 million in the fund and lost it all.  Granted, that is alot of money to lose and I feel sorry for them, but I'd like to point out that most of that money more than likely came from the fees that Peloton collected from its investors when it posted 87% returns last year.  Moral of the story?  Every 4-10 years a leveraged disaster occurs.  It's why Warren Buffett always has $40 billion in cash sitting around.  Because when spreads widen unexpectedly and everyone is dying to invest at amazing levels but can't because they are losing their shirts, my buddy Warren steps up to the plate and knocks it out of the park.  God, I love that man!

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Everyone wonders why he has such more invested in insurance companies as well. What a delicate game he plays. Have some really smart people figure out all of probablities. Then price that insurance to the worst case scenario that way anything that happens inside of that is all gravy!!!!! Talk about your forward breakeven. K10 I also love Warren. How about the little carrot he dangled in front of the boys..."I will take all of that very nasty uncomplicated muni paper and talke that off your hands. In return, I will let you hold all the mortgage paper for a minute and I'll be right back...I promise.)