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Page 21 company. At Druckenmiller's behest, they doubled their position in March to $600 million. They had bought the stock at $50 a share in 1999 and rode it to $258 by late February. The stock had fallen to $135 by early April and further to $96 later in April.17 Druckenmiller resigned on April 18, and the announcement was made on April 28. He took the summer off and said he would decide what to do—but it was unlikely that he would run a large public fund. He continues to manage Duquesne Capital Management, which he started in 1981 with $1 million in assets. Duquesne investors include his alma mater Bowdoin College, Berea College, and Denison University. Returns have been comparable to Quantum since 1989 when Druckenmiller took over its management—about 30 percent per year. Duquesne assets under management are currently estimated at $2 to $3 billion. Investing Background Edge.Soros was born in Budapest, Hungary, in 1930. He made his way to London in 1947 and graduated from the London School of Economics in 1952. In 1956, he came to the United States. From 1956 to 1959 he had a job as an arbitrageur at F. M. Mayer in New York. He developed a new form of arbitrage—internal arbitrage—where common stocks, warrants, and bonds were separately traded before they could be officially detached from each other.18 Then he went to Wertheim & Co. (1959–1963) and on to Arnhold & S. Bleichroder (1963–1973). Soros had a competitive edge over his colleagues. He had knowledge of European financial markets.19 People on Wall Street had little experience in understanding European markets, and only a handful arbitraged London and New York. From the moment he arrived in the United States, Soros was tagged an expert in the field. Soros persuaded management at Arnhold & S. Bleichroder to set up two offshore funds and let him oversee them. First Eagle, a long-only fund, was started in 1967. Double Eagle, a hedge fund, was started in 1969. He started the first fund with $250,000 of his own money, and another $6 million poured in from Europeans who knew him. The offshore funds were based in Curaçao but he operated them from New York. In 1970, Soros and Jim Rogers teamed up. Generally, Rogers did the investigating and Soros did the investing. When brokerage firm regulations were imposed that meant Rogers |
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