2014 Earnings: $1.3 billion.
One of the most successful hedge fund managers ever, Steve Cohen may have shut down his SAC Capital hedge fund firm after it pleaded guilty to insider-trading charges, but he continues to successfully trade his own money. Cohen returned his outside investors’ money and now manages his own fortune in a family office called Point72 Asset Management. The son of a dress manufacturer who worked in Manhattan’s garment district, Cohen did take a hit from the sprawling government insider-trading investigation that targeted his firm, which paid $1.8 billion to the federal government to cover SAC’s penalties. He was never criminally charged, but several former SAC employees were convicted. An avid poker player, Cohen started trading with $7,000 that was supposed to be part of his tuition payment at the Wharton School, ultimately developing his own rapid-fire style of trading that won him praise at Gruntal, his first forage into Wall Street. By 1992, he founded SAC with $20 million of his own money. The hedge fund did so well that it was able to charged some of the industry’s richest fees. Cohen is looking to clean up his image, rebranding his family office, launching a new, glossy website, and making big name hires to increase surveillance and compliance.
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