YouSaid · the spoken record

Jeffrey Solomon

lines on the record: 75
first: 2017-05-30
most recent: 2017-05-30
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Ted, you're an amazing person. We just end up having these conversations and you get me to a really good places. So that's a very special thing about you. And I wish you all the luck with these. I think they're They're amazing. So congrats to you, and I wish you all the best.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And that's probably something I totally did not get in my late thirties. Then I now look at what we've been able to accomplish here in a really tough environment over the last decade. And I'm thankful that I got the opportunity. I really am. I'm super thankful that my partners at Cowen, my teammates embraced me because I'm not an obvious choice to do the things I'm doing. I came from a different place. And they believed in me and trusted me and I trusted them and we were able to create the framework for a firm that I think has tremendous runway. And I love that. And I just, it's only because I've given them space to be the best that they can be and made it less about me. And that's just what I would say is the thing I've learned about.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And I had no objectivity. And it would have been great if I had taken a step back and said, you know, let me just let go a little bit. And we're surrounded by some really good people and give them a chance to breathe and listen to them. And if you surrounded yourself with a really good team, which we had at Ramius at the time, and we still do, right, at Callen, they will nourish you. They will give you oxygen in the moments where you most need it.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I know that I don't have to squeeze so hard. Sports people talk about this all the time. You hear a baseball player when he's going through a slump. He's like, I'm just gripping the bat too tight. You know, hockey players talk about, I'm gripping the stick too tight. You're tight. I was tight Coming into the financial crisis, I felt every trade was my responsibility. Every winner was somebody else's and every loser was mine. And I loved Ramius so much that I almost choked it.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Importantly, what you don't like about it, and write it down. Because chances are the things that you like and don't like about the places where you are are things that are going to be with you for the rest of your life. And so when you're looking at the next job opportunity, make sure that the next job opportunity is filled with many more things that you like and far fewer things that you don't like. And I'm sort of speaking to the 22-year-old me when I say that because I didn't think about that. And so here's the good news. It's going to work out even if you don't do all that 50-year-old advice stuff that you don't want to hear. But you know, you probably should hear it. Because inherently you're human and humans particularly intelligent humans, all humans, really figure it out in some way. And so, you know, the advice I would give to 20-year-olds starting out is, you know, do what you need to do.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Where you don't have responsibilities for somebody else or a bunch of little somebody else's. And later it gets into your late twenties and early thirties, you're going to opt into that lifestyle. Most of you will. Some won't, but they'll make choices not to do that. But more likely than not, you're going to find a partner that you're going to want to share your life with. The flip side of that is it's just less about you. It's now about the collective you. And if you haven't really done the work to understand what makes you happy, what makes you motivated, what gives you psychic joy in those early years, it's just harder to find that later on because it becomes about pleasing others again. So my advice is always find out who you are. Latch on to organizations where you feel like you can make an impact in the work that you're doing so that and figure out what you like about that first job and really”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Your life. And you can either look at that one of two ways. Oh my God, it's my life, and I have no idea what I'm going to do. Or, oh my God, it's my life and I have no idea what I want to be. And my encouragement would be to choose the latter. It's not what you do that matters, per se, but who you are that matters. And in the first years of your career, you're exploring who you are as an adult. And it's the only time in your life when you can do that without attachment.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, I mean, I got to give him credit. He listens. He'll argue with me, which is what he should be doing. But listen, I think the most important thing that you need to do during your 20s is recognize that it's really all about you. And it sounds selfish, but it's absolutely true. Up until the time you're 18, it's your parents really govern for the most part, the box in which you're allowed to play. Some are a little tighter, some are a little wider, but it's your parents' box. And then you get to pick and choose which college you want to go to within a box, but it's still a box. And at that college, you kind of think that you have more, you're your own person. But the reality is you've got coursework and you've got syllabuses and things you've got to do in order to graduate. It's a box. Then you turn 22 and boom.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I don't think I'll ever get over that week. The good and the not so good. So those would be, you know, that would probably has to be my favorite moment.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I was listening to it on the radio because it was blacked out in Pittsburgh. I remember my father when he came home. From the game. He was the happiest I had ever seen him. And this is you have to think about the Sealers had been perennial losers for 40 years. Nothing ever went right. I mean, for goodness sake, they kicked a field goal to win the last game of the OJ Sweepstakes and didn't get OJ And in that moment, everything changed. For the city And then the next week Roberto Clemente died in a plane crash. And I remember never being so happy, mostly because my dad was just over the moon and his, you know, sisters and my grandfather and my mom, everybody, the whole city, but that was my world, right? And then everybody was like despondent five days later, six days later.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Or spiritually. I can honestly say, I don't think I waste time. I can't think of one thing I do that I would say is, you know, it's a waste of time.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Wow, a complete waste of time? Sure. I'd have to really think about that. I like to sit out back and smoke a cigar. I don't think it's a waste of time, so it's hard for me. I got to think about this, though. I love to take downtime. You and I have talked about this. So I used to think that was a waste of time. If I'm not doing something, I'm wasting time. And the reality is watching TV show and vegging, there's something really relaxing about that. Sitting out back and smoking a cigar and thinking forty-year-old me wouldn't be like, why are you wasting time? There's tons of stuff to do. And the 50-year-old one-year-old me is like, well, I can't wait to do that because I have so many things I want to think about with the business, with my life, with my kids, with my wife. And I treasure that. So I don't think I waste time. I just think I choose to do things to nourish myself intellectually.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Past. And I'll just say this trust never goes out of style. Someone said that to me. I'm like, you know what? You're right. You know what? I do business with people I inherently think have my back and I'm willing to pay them more than I probably should but trust is a real value and a real commodity that you cannot replace by a machine or anything else. And so whatever we're going to be doing a calendar in 10 years or however the market shape up, our goal is to ensure that we do not squander the trust we've built for the people we serve. I know that sounds really like ideal, but you would be surprised when you have opportunities to make money and it might squander the trust if you make the right decision in the moment and recognize that that's the thing you need to preserve because that's your franchise. Long term you can build some serious wealth and that's I think”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I would just say the only thing I know is that it's going to be different. 10 years is an eternity. It's like it's a generation and a half on Wall Street. You know, this generation of capital committers, the 30-somethings, the last time we had 5% short-term rates, they might have been in diapers. We're in a very different spot. And so I can't imagine what risk taking is going to look like in 10 years. There's a few things that I will say. One, active management isn't going away. So I think there will always be a portion of the market that wants to outperform and is willing to pay for the option around outperformance. So I think that's going to still be here. I think if you're not doing data analytics and you're not doing things to make yourself, enable yourself to see more than you can see as a human by just analyzing pools of data to make better investment decisions, you're going to get left in that.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Wow. I mean, I don't want to punt on that question, but I think about where I was personally 10 years ago. And I could have never imagined this. So really, I mean, it would have been 2007 and things were looking pretty darn good in May of 2007. I thought I was the king of the world and everything I touched turned to gold. I had a great year in the first month of 2007. That's like, this should have been a warning signal to me in retrospect. There's nothing in my portfolio that would have suggested I would have ever outperformed the way we outperformed in the first quarter. I never took the time to say, oh my, I should really think about de-risking because I've made the entire year this quarter. I'm like, no, it's a paradigm shift. I had all these rationales for I backed into a rationale in explaining our performance in the first quarter of 2007.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And in times of stress, if I know anything, liquidity gets worse. So we've been in the most low volatility environment in my time ever investing. And liquidity in the underlying markets has also never been worse across all asset classes. So just to repeat that, usually in up markets, we've seen great liquidity. You can sell anything in an upmarket. You can buy anything in an upmarket. Those are the hallmarks, the health of the plumbing, of how people generate returns. And yet, if you talk to the traders who trade equities or trade fixed income or really any instrument, liquidity has never been worse. So we've had great upside moves and terrible liquidity. Well, here's one thing I'm pretty sure of. In the next down move, liquidity is not going to improve.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And so when it went the other way, there were massive amounts of losses. An inverted pyramid. We've all heard about it. To me, we don't know what will happen when ETFs, if ETFs, find massive outflows. There are, in many ETFs, significant mismatches between the liquidity that the ETF promises and the underlying liquidity of the instrument.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I just think I want to see what happens when ETFs, by the way, are the thing that just like there's knowns and known unknowns, right? We know that there's going to be a market correction. We don't know how it's going to happen. We can surmise. ETFs are just structured products. There's a couple of things I just have noticed in my career. It seems to me that structure always and the combination of structure and leverage always ends up in a bad place. CDS was the fastest growing credit default swaps, the fastest growing tradable instrument in the history of mankind. It went from nowhere in two thousand three to everywhere in two thousand eight. Trillions and trillions of dollars of it. CDS or something inherently wrong with CDS, right? It's an interesting way for two individuals to take a bet on a credit that's offline or not in the non-cash markets. It's just we had too much of it and no one could keep troll of it.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“To make more well informed decisions. And so I think there's going to be some great opportunities in that area in equities. I think we're going to invariably have, I'm sitting, we're sitting on a lot of cash being defensive because I think you're going to get a chance to buy some stuff cheap. And if it turns out we're wrong, we're still going to be okay. I think that's a great power position to be in if we underperform a little bit on the upside. You never get fired for doing that. And so that's kind of what we're thinking about. We're going to be launching some new products here, so probably shouldn't talk about them too much.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That's a great question. So I think that there are some really amazing opportunities to do things in some non-correlated assets. I'm not exactly sure how scalable they are, but I think there's going to be some great opportunities to take advantage of the lack of volatility in the marketplace. I think there's some innovative ways that we're working on to quantitatively take advantage of getting long volatility at the right times. Those are, I know they sound like the Holy Grail, but if we can get them to work right, I think they'll be really scalable and they're more quantitative in nature. I get really super excited about anything that's data-driven in terms of investment. I think computer-assisted and data-driven assisted investing is the best. I'm skeptical about quant investing just because I've had a few instances in which the model stopped working and people spend a lot of time trying to figure out what happened. So I'm much more interested in how do we develop data analytics that enable fundamental investors.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Arguing. Like, let's talk about why we're actually arguing. Because if we're arguing because we have different ideas on how to get to a common goal, let's focus on the common goal. Because we all have something here we want to get accomplished. Let's establish the baseline for what we're trying to get accomplished. Some days at summer camp, it's just getting to the end of the day. I just want to be able to get to the end of the day and have fun. Okay, let's talk about how we're going to do that and how we're going to navigate that. Those are basic skills, I think, that are at the center of human interaction in groups. And you learn that at places like SummerCamp.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And I feel like part of my coping mechanism that I learned at summer camp and in other places. But first, at summer camp is how can I evolve so that things don't change doesn't get foisted on me before I have to react because that makes me feel really uncomfortable. I also think that summer camp is where you learn leadership skills. You learn how to fit in with a group, how to play with a group, how people you like and people you don't like, and you inherently get a sense for where you want to affiliate and associate when you get to make choices. At summer camp, you end up in a cabin with a bunch of people and you got to make it work. And it's all day, every day, 24 hours a day. And that sometimes can be super hard, but you got to make it work because you don't have a choice. You know, when things get tough here, which sometimes they do, you know, we have disagreements and people that are at each other from time to time, you can sit down and say, hey, hey, hey, are we on the same team and what are we trying to get accomplished here?”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Learn how to deal with change. And my biggest way to deal with change is be the agent of change. You should be encouraging change and evolution before change gets you. Turns out change isn't so bad if you're the one doing it.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, I'm going to write a book someday. I think I told you. I'm going to write a book that's called Everything I Ever Needed to Know I Learned in Summer Camp. It's true. You know, I think back to my earliest days, I learned a whole bunch about myself in retrospect makes a ton of sense. I have difficulty with transition, it turns out. I mean, a lot of people do, but I really cried when I went to summer camp and I cried when I came home from summer camp. I didn't want to leave home because I was having fun there and I cried for the first two days and then I was having a time in my life. And then when camp was over, I cried because I don't want to go home. And I learned that about me. So when I have like transitions in life and in business, I already know what that feeling is. I learned that feeling when I went away to summer camp the first time. And I recognize that in myself and say, hey, Jeff, it's going to be just fine. You know, you have difficulty with transition. And so, and change. And so I'd say at a very basic level, summer camp made me.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“In that spirit. I don't know everybody I'm helping, but if I help a life or two somewhere, they're going to go on and do amazing things for others in the future. That's, I mean, what more can you ask for? And that's my philanthropic mission.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Somebody came from somewhere that wasn't so good. They made a really bold decision to leave, leave family, leave friends, leave everything sometimes, and jump into usually a ship or a plane or whatever, and come to a place where they didn't know anybody. They came for the ideal. And they came for future generations. They came because they knew that if they worked really hard, the next generation of the generation after that would be successful. What is often forgotten is Most of those people who made brave decisions had others help them. In my case, there was some man who was a very wealthy French Jew who was helping to relocate Jews in Eastern Europe to Canada, which is where my great-grandfather came. Without him, like my great-grandfather could have wanted to go any one of a number of places, but he didn't have the means. So for me, philanthropy is about giving back.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“More importantly, what it gives back to me is I know I'm making a difference in the lives of others. And they make it easy for me. And if I look back in my history, and I think all Americans can look back on this, it's not just the Jewish story. It's the American story in large parts. All of us, if you look back,”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Give money that we didn't have, and we felt bad at the dinner table that we couldn't do more. And so I was really 40 years old before I realized the value of giving to philanthropy. UJ Federation does a ton here in New York. It was sort of one of the number one supporters during the AIDS crisis, the 80s and 90s, certainly one of the biggest supporters of Hurricane Sandy victims more recently. It does a lot to invest in social services here in New York City, which is my community now. And it does a lot for Jews worldwide who don't have the things they need to have, and it ensures Jewish continuity. And those are things that are important to me.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“My involvement with UJ Federation actually in particular was late. I didn't really come to it until I was 40 years old. And part of that is because my experience with UJ Federation in Pittsburgh or United Jewish Federation at Pittsburgh was one where they always asked my parents to”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, I think everybody has their own philanthropic journey. I feel extremely fortunate. And I have more money than I thought I would have. I never really thought about how much money I would have, but I kind of feel pretty good. I still have to work, right? I'm still not ready to be done working. But there's an element of that that I feel fortunate enough that I can help others who have less than me. And it's really interesting, this psychic joy you get from doing that. I never really focused on it. I used to feel bad that I couldn't do more. And that feeling bad that I couldn't do more overwhelmed the joy I got from doing something. So what I would say is you don't have to be the CEO of a firm to make an impact. Actually, I wish a few regrets, but one of the ones is I wish I had realized that earlier, that the little bit that I could have done was just good. I was doing what I could do as opposed to feeling bad about not being able to do more.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That's actually my job. And I don't discount the fact that they're individuals and they want to succeed on their own. I just want to be the enabler of that. And if they value the enablement, if they value the way that we permission them with tools and products and services and relationships, and they can be better here than anywhere else, but they're still individuals who want to win desperately. And that is the essence of teamwork. And to me, that's sort of how you embrace this notion of empathy in the context of having an industry that inherently gets people who might be more selfish. Because anybody who's long-term successful and long-term greedy knows that it takes a village. That's the kind of people I think we're looking for.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“for the sake of the whole. Actually, let's acknowledge the fact out of the gate that everybody who comes to Wall Street has an entrepreneurial spirit. So I'm willing to listen to what other people have to say because I believe at the end of the day provided that they're on the same rationality spectrum as I am, that the teammates we have at Cowan are giving me advice based on what will make them better. Could be more selfish or less selfish, but let's face it, they want Cowan to help them be better here than anywhere else.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I'd like to think so. I mean, everybody wants, but that's part of it. Like, everyone wants to think they're special, and I believe the people who work account are special. I do. I also think they're individuals, though. So let's be really clear. Empathy is not a substitute. It does not mean that you have to be giving up your intellectual.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“By the way, you know, there's an economic trade in there too. There's an economic element to that, but it's secondary too. Can I move the needle for you? And can we move the needle for each other? Can I lend my brand to enhance your opportunity set? Affiliate with one another to be in a better spot than we were. That is all empathy at work. And I just think it's one of the most core human. Characteristics, which is part of what makes us different from the rest of the animal kingdom, and nobody talks about it, especially in this day and age. Yeah.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“At the forefront of drug discovery, there. Yes, I'm going to make money doing it, but I came to this industry because I want to help. And I feel like in, you know, in our business on Wall Street, we should be asking that all the time from others. So my engagements as a former bysider with Wall Street firms were not so great. I had to deal with them, with the firms on Wall Street as opposed to wanted to deal with them. And yet there were always a handful of individuals who I felt actually got me at a much more visceral level. And I wanted to do business with them. It didn't matter what card they carried, necessarily, right? It mattered that I trusted them and that their firms could deliver for them when I needed them to. So that's really the secret to doing this in my mind. Managing is all about saying I feel you and I think I can be helpful.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Person you're trying to engage with. You don't have to agree with it. You just need to understand it. And the best way to understand how somebody thinks or what motivates them is to try and imagine what it's like to be them. That's empathy. I want to know what are the things you care most about? Why are you doing what you're doing? Just explain that to me. And when you ask questions like that from clients, a lot of times you'll hear answers that you would agree with. You know, I really want to provide for my kids. Or, you know, I really think we can change the world if we develop this pharmaceutical drug and there is this orphan drug for this community of individuals who have no hope.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, it's one of our three characteristics we admire most in our calendars vision, how is it what you're doing? Can make an impact internally or externally. Tenacity, can you go out and get it, make it happen, or are you sort of waiting? Like, you have to be tenacious in this business. But you have to be empathetic. And the reason is because you need to understand what motivates.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You know, I've been a Management positions, and there's a very big disconnect between great producers and great managers. Turns out management is a somewhat different skill set. I think the number one thing you need to think about as a manager is empathy. I do. Empathy. Empathy. Empathy.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Talk a little bit about management of a firm. The money management business is not notoriously gifted for being good people managers as many other businesses are in comparison, as money managers. How do you think about managing people?”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Because we expect that over the next two years, we're going to get multiple of that back in MA fees, in increased commissions, because we saw opportunities in a trough year last year to make investments that we think are going to be long-term sustainable. That's a very transparent statement that you have to make to the market. I still think our investors would like us to eg out quarterly performance numbers in terms of ROE. They would prefer that it happens sooner rather than later. It's going to happen, and it will happen as the markets in which we've invested evolve the way we think they will.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yes, I think if you're public, you have to play a little bit more to quarterly and short-term investing. I do because there's expectations built in. And think about it. I always think about who's the stakeholders, the owners, the shareholders. So who are they? Largely active managers, what do active managers need? They need performance and they need it soon. So that begets shorter term thinking. They have daily liquidity funds, most of them. They need performance or people are just going to redeem and move into the passive product. So I think we have to, you have to create balance and set expectations. It's okay to take a profitable business and invest a portion of your profits to a longer-term growth objective. But you probably need to be a little bit more transparent about the fact that you're doing that. So last year, we lost money at Cowan. We told our investors very clearly, this is the amount of money we spent on people and infrastructure that added no revenue this year.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Here commonly that public companies have quarterly pressure for earnings. And is that real? I mean, do you feel that? Or it sounds like it's more like, hey, Warren Buffett model. We're going to make long-term investments. We're going to pay any attention to the quarters”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Seven years. I think that's a very long period of time. But if we had suboptimized or optimized for trying to do quarterly returns at various times, we would have missed opportunities to make meaningful investments in businesses that are going to be long-term sustainable for us. So it's a different time frame. But it's really the same allocation methodology.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Now finally beginning to reach the size and scale where the investments that we're making can drive profitability long term.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I thought about how to manufacture alpha in the various strategies that we had and the various positions that underlied those strategies. Same thing. I'm thinking about how we're allocating the firm's time and energy and money to achieve a goal of penetrating marketplaces. So instead of thinking about investment returns per se, I'm thinking about whether or not we can make an impact enough in a market share that will drive revenues, that will ultimately drive ROE at the firm. And it's a much longer period of time. So when I was running our multi-strategy firm, I was trying to scratch out monthly returns, which I think is really almost impossible, but we did it for like a decade, which is, I think, not sustainable, it turns out. We returned all the money in our multi-strategy fund because living up to that ideal was impossible at the end. When I think about the investments we're making at Calan, we've been at this for seven years and we're”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“There are actually many similarities, actually a tremendous number of similarities and a few differences. But I'll start by saying this, you know, we were just talking about active and passive. So I believe that's dominating the entire investment landscape. So wherever you live in the investment landscape, if you're not discussing this and figuring out how you're going to engage with the active passive battle, everything else you're doing is a derivative of that debate, in my opinion. So at Callan, we made a decision that we're only going to cater to active management. So Calan investment management, we sell alpha generating capabilities directly to the end buyer, and account and company were selling alpha to the alpha provider to the end buyer. Same thing. When I think about my portfolio skills I learn in managing the multi-strategy fund at Ramius, which I did with Morgan Stark for the better part of a decade.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, I'm going to circle back. We left sort of a decade gap out. We certainly don't need to fill in 98 to 2008. But at one point in time, the Ramius business, which was a private investment partnership, merged into Cowan and is a public company, your executive of the public company. Talk a little bit about the differences and how do you approach thinking about either allocating capital, managing a business when you are running a public company as opposed to when you just had a private investment partnership.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Longer time horizons, but if you're a long only manager in your closet indexing, you're going to get killed. You can't possibly justify your fee structure. So a number of players are taking up their positions from 100 to 40 and just owning the ones and being right. And recognizing that that's actually what you're getting paid to do. You're getting paid to pick stocks. You're not getting paid to aggregate assets. And listen, there's a several hundred trillion dollars in active management, whatever it is. It's like a huge number. I mean, Fidelity alone has two trillion, an actively managed product. It's going to take a while for that to take hold, but I think from our standpoint, a Cowan, when we think about how we're catering to the active manager, we have to have high conviction names. We have to have high conviction themes that have multiple names and ways to play.”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, the clients I'm talking to are really changing their, at least let's talk about equities, which is the one I probably know best, more concentrated positions, higher conviction trade names”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, I think if that's going to come home to Roost, I mean, just like hedge funds were the rage, and then people said, hey, I think I'm overpaying for beta here. And I think I can get that cheaper. Or just like mutual funds with a rage, actively managed. And then people are like, hey, I'm overpaying for beta. Look, people have crowded into a really cheap alternative. And look, it makes a lot of sense. The siren of passive investing is, I mean, every time you go to your financial advisor, don't they pull out that really wonderful chart that shows you the efficient frontier and how to allocate your...”
2017-05-30 · Capital Allocators · Jeffrey Solomon – Vision, Tenacity, and Empathy (Capital Allocators, EP.09) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source