James Simons: Conquering Wall Street with Mathematics

Happy Thanksgiving everyone and I can't think of a better way to honor the occasion than to present yesterday's Ritholtz column which should very much appeal to all the techies in our group.  This was yesterday's entry but it should appeal to all the engineers in the group who like the purely mathematical approach to stock picking.  Hope everyone is having a great holiday. 


James Simons: Conquering Wall Street with Mathematics - The Big Picture

James Simons: Conquering Wall Street with Mathematics

November 22, 2017 6:00pm by Barry Ritholtz

A speech and Q&A with billionaire and the second richest hedge fund manager in the world, James Simons. In this speech James talks about his life, career and the events that lead him to starting Renaissance Technologies. James also goes on to speak about why Renaissance technologies is so successful and his guiding principles for life.

Video Segments:
0:00 Introduction
4:25 Early Life
8:04 MIT
10:35 Road trip to South America
12:18 Berkley
13:18 First investments
18:20 Urge to do something different/ First business
20:26 Back to academia
26:09 Opposing the war/ Getting fired
30:45 Stony Brook University
36:26 Managing money
39:39 Becoming a trader
45:53 Renaissance technologies/ What makes it successful
49:40 Simons foundation
54:04 Mathematics as a refuge
55:40 Retirement
57:19 Guiding principles
1:00:45 Start of Q&A
1:01:12 When not to do something?
1:02:20 Thoughts on hedge fund industry today?
1:04:31 Why do you focus on collaborative goals?
1:06:30 How did your parents help foster your mathematical knowledge?
1:07:15 When you look back, would you change anything?
1:08:14 Do you think you should share your knowledge?
1:09:52 Thoughts on mathematics education?
1:17:55 Bourbaki movement?

Source: Investors Archive, October 30, 2014