With an annual income of 2.5 billion, this hedge fund manager is making a fortune!

Who is the highest-paid hedge fund manager in the world?

Chris Hohn, a British man, may be one of the candidates.

In just 2023, he took a dividend of 2.5 billion yuan for himself.

This is only a part of his wealth. The TCI investment fund (The Children Investment Fund Management) he owns gives him huge dividends every year, like a "goose that lays golden eggs".

In addition, he also has the famous nickname "the most expensive divorced man in the UK". In 2014, he divorced his ex-wife, who directly took away 530 million US dollars in assets from Chris Hohn. But this did not affect his wealth much.

How did Chris Hohn become the "invisible big goose" in the investment world?

Earning 6.81 million yuan per day

Recently, the most shocking news in the European hedge fund industry is that an institution called TCI Investment Fund Management, founded by Chris Hohn, "paid" himself a dividend of 276 million pounds this year.

According to the latest exchange rate, the above salary figure is equivalent to 2.487 billion yuan.

This means that the hedge fund leader earned 6.81 million yuan per natural day in a year.

If calculated based on trading days, this daily salary level would be even higher!

But this is not the most he earned in a single year.

The previous year, TCI gave Chris Hohn a dividend of 574 million pounds, more than twice as much as this year.

So, it's not hard to understand how Chris Hohn has accumulated over 60 billion yuan in wealth.

"Prime Minister" has worked for him

Chris Hohn's wealth mainly comes from his hedge fund company TCI.

This is a standard traditional equity investment institution, with one main business - trading stocks.

The official website of the institution shows that TCI's investment strategy focuses on fundamental value investment, covering global stocks, and also involves real estate loan business.

But with just this business, TCI Investment Fund has made a lot of money, even surpassing Renaissance Technologies (the calendar company of the Medal Fund, the most profitable institution in the world last year) and Castle Investment in 2019.

A true winner in the hedge fund industry.

TCI Investment Fund was established in 2003, based in London, and its Chinese translation is "The Children Investment Fund Management".

This institution has employed many talented individuals, including the current "Prime Minister" of the UK, Sunak, who worked for TCI for three years.

From a humble background

The key figure behind TCI Investment Fund is the protagonist of this article, Chris Hohn. (See the image below)

According to data from a well-known platform, as of the end of 2022, Hohn's net worth reached $8.21 billion, equivalent to RMB 58.6 billion.

In other words, Hohn's wealth is on par with that of Masayoshi Son, who has reached $8.5 billion, and surpasses celebrities such as Li Ka-shing and Pansy Ho.

Information shows that Hohn's father was a car mechanic born in Jamaica, who moved to the UK in 1960. Hohn entered the University of Southampton in the 1980s and graduated with first-class honors in accounting and business economics. He later graduated from Harvard Business School.

When he first entered the workplace, Hohn initially worked for a private equity firm before joining a hedge fund and eventually becoming the head of its London operations.

Regardless, he is very good at making money. It is said that when Hohn founded TCI Investment Fund in 2003, he had already earned £75 million from his previous employer.

How does he make money?

TCI Investment Fund is able to make so much money, so there must be some "unique skills".

For example, in the international capital market, he is known for his "shareholder activism".

Shareholder activism refers to external shareholders actively intervening and participating in major corporate decisions.

Investors with this style often develop into the kind of "vulture investors" who acquire companies at low prices and then sell them off.

Hohn may not be that extreme, but he is not easy to deal with either, often providing "guidance" to the companies he invests in.

In addition, he is also good at seizing opportunities with high-growth stocks. The official website of TCI Investment Fund lists important investment targets such as aircraft manufacturing giant Airbus, Google's parent company Alphabet, and Spanish telecommunications company Cellnex.

Frequently meddling in major companies

In November 2022, this hedge fund called on Google's parent company to reduce losses in its long-term bets on the autonomous driving car division Waymo, and "urged" the company to significantly reduce staff and salaries to lower operating costs.

In a letter to Alphabet's CEO, Hohn stated that the extent of layoffs should reach 20%!

This is no longer just an "investment suggestion", it is almost like "meddling"! In February 2023, Horn also demanded that Airbus immediately abandon its plan to acquire the cybersecurity division of French IT company Atos. The hedge fund holds about 3% of Airbus shares and questioned the motives behind the acquisition.

In addition, in 2006, TCI Investment Fund also invested in Hong Kong-listed Leading Homes and subsequently had a "fierce confrontation" with the management of the organization.

At that time, the former chairman of Leading Homes, Zheng Mingxun, described TCI's investment in Leading Homes as a "wrong purchase" and stated that the organization did not understand Hong Kong society and public sentiment, thinking that investing in Leading Homes would quickly increase its market value.

The most crucial point is that the former chairman of Leading Homes made the above statement a few months before resigning for personal reasons, and there were also other senior executives who left. Market speculation suggests that after TCI invested in Leading Homes, it continuously "pressured" the management team of the listed company to increase rent, leading to a conflict in business philosophy between the new shareholder and the original management team.

This, to some extent, reflects the investment characteristics of this organization.