Tiger Management Corp., also known as "The Tiger Fund", is an American

hedge fund A hedge fund is a pooled investment fund that trades in relatively liquid assets and is able to make extensive use of more complex trading, portfolio-construction, and risk management techniques in an attempt to improve performance, such as sho ...

and

family office A family office is a privately held company that handles investment management and wealth management for a wealthy family, generally one with at least $50-$100 million in investable assets, with the goal being to effectively grow and transfer ...

founded by

Julian Robertson Julian Hart Robertson Jr. (June 25, 1932 – August 23, 2022) was an American billionaire hedge fund manager, and philanthropist. Robertson founded Tiger Management, one of the first hedge funds, in 1980. From its inception in 1980 to its 1 ...

. The fund began investing in 1980 and closed in March 2000/01. It continues to operate today in direct public equity investments and seeding new investment funds.

History

, a

stockbroker A stockbroker is a regulated broker, broker-dealer, or registered investment adviser (in the United States) who may provide financial advisory and investment management services and execute transactions such as the purchase or sale of stocks an ...

and former

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

officer An officer is a person who has a position of authority in a hierarchical organization. The term derives from Old French ''oficier'' "officer, official" (early 14c., Modern French ''officier''), from Medieval Latin ''officiarius'' "an officer," f ...

, started Tiger Management in 1980 with $8 million in capital. By 1996, the fund’s assets had increased to $7.2 billion in value. and On April 1, 1996 ''

BusinessWeek ''Bloomberg Businessweek'', previously known as ''BusinessWeek'', is an American weekly business magazine published fifty times a year. Since 2009, the magazine is owned by New York City-based Bloomberg L.P. The magazine debuted in New York City ...

'' carried a

cover story Cover story or Cover Story may refer to: * A magazine or newspaper article whose subject appears on that issue's front cover, and may be profiled in depth. * A fictitious explanation intended to hide one's real motive; see disinformation, cover-u ...

written by reporter

Gary Weiss Gary Weiss is an Americans, American investigative journalist, columnist and author of books that examine the ethics of Wall Street. He was also a contributing editor for ''Condé Nast Portfolio''. His ''Businessweek'' articles exposed organize ...

, called "Fall of the Wizard", that was critical of Robertson's performance and behavior as founder and manager of Tiger Management. Robertson subsequently sued Weiss and ''BusinessWeek'' for $1 billion for

defamation Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defini ...

. The suit was

settled A settler is a person who has migrated to an area and established a permanent residence there, often to colonize the area. A settler who migrates to an area previously uninhabited or sparsely inhabited may be described as a pioneer. Settle ...

with no money changing hands and ''BusinessWeek'' standing by the substance of its reporting. With $10.5 billion of assets under management in 1997, it was the second largest hedge fund in the world at the time. Its holdings climbed to $22 billion in 1998. Tiger's largest equity holding at that time was

U.S. Airways US Airways (formerly USAir) was a major United States airline that operated from 1937 until its merger with American Airlines in 2015. It was originally founded in Pittsburgh as a mail delivery airline called All American Aviation, which soon b ...

, whose troubles dragged down the value of his holdings. Such missteps ultimately led him to close his investment company in March 2000 and return all outside capital to investors. Tiger earlier made $2 billion in gains, but gave most of them back during a huge one-day move in the yen in 1998. In September 2001, Robertson distributed 24.8 million greatly devalued U.S. Airways shares over to former investors in Tiger. Robertson declared his intent to keep the stock. U.S. Airways declared

bankruptcy Bankruptcy is a legal process through which people or other entities who cannot repay debts to creditors may seek relief from some or all of their debts. In most jurisdictions, bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the debtor ...

in 2002, and shareholders in the airline were wiped out.

Aftermath and legacy

After closing his Tiger Fund in 2000, Robertson started to use his own capital, experience, and infrastructure to support and finance ("seed") upcoming hedge fund managers. As of September 2009, Robertson had helped launch 38 hedge funds ("Tiger Seeds") in return for a stake in their

fund management Asset management is a systematic approach to the governance and realization of value from the things that a group or entity is responsible for, over their whole life cycles. It may apply both to tangible assets (physical objects such as buildings ...

companies. Apart from those Tiger Seeds, a considerable number of analysts and managers Robertson employed and mentored at Tiger Management went out on their own and are now running some of the best-known hedge fund firms, called "Tiger Cubs", run by Tiger alumni such as

Ole Andreas Halvorsen Ole Andreas Halvorsen (born 1961) is a Norwegian billionaire Hedge fund, hedge fund manager. He is the CEO and a co-founder of the Connecticut-based hedge fund, Viking Global Investors.

, Chris Shumway,

Lee Ainslie Lee S. Ainslie III is the head of hedge fund Maverick Capital. He is a value investor that is particularly known for his investments in the technology sector. Early life and education Ainslie's father was headmaster of Episcopal High School, a p ...

, Stephen Mandel, John Griffin, Philippe Laffont, Dan Morehead, David Gerstenhaber,

David Goel David E. Goel (born 1970) is an American hedge fund manager. Goel is the managing general partner of Matrix Capital Management, which he co-founded with pioneering investor Paul Ferri in 1999. Goel is also a protégé of hedge fund manager Jul ...

Chase Coleman Chase Coleman (born March 20, 1985) is an American actor, director, and musician. Coleman portrayed the character of Billy Winslow in the HBO TV series ''Boardwalk Empire'' and the werewolf, Oliver, on the ''CW'' spin-off series, ''The Origin ...

Martin Hughes Martin may refer to: Places * Martin City (disambiguation) * Martin County (disambiguation) * Martin Township (disambiguation) Antarctica * Martin Peninsula, Marie Byrd Land * Port Martin, Adelie Land * Point Martin, South Orkney Islands Austral ...

, Bill Hwang and Paul Touradji. "The modern-day emergence of hedge funds can be attributed to a 1986 article in the ''

Institutional Investor An institutional investor is an entity which pools money to purchase securities, real property, and other investment assets or originate loans. Institutional investors include commercial banks, central banks, credit unions, government-linked co ...

'' highlighting the extraordinary returns of the Tiger Fund. The article spurred investor interest and financing; since that time, hedge funds have increasingly attracted investment and human capital." The ''Wall Street Journal'' reported in June 2010 that Robertson was considering reopening his firm to outside investors. John Townsend, a former partner at

Goldman Sachs Goldman Sachs () is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company. Founded in 1869, Goldman Sachs is headquartered at 200 West Street in Lower Manhattan, with regional headquarters in London, Warsaw, Bangalore, H ...

, was hired as the chief operating officer, and Robertson's son Alex joined the firm. The new hires were part of a potential expansion that could involve creating a "seeding" fund or a

fund of hedge funds A "fund of funds" (FOF) is an investment strategy of holding a portfolio of other investment funds rather than investing directly in stocks, bonds or other securities. This type of investing is often referred to as multi-manager investment. A f ...

for outside investors. According to ''Institutional Investor'' magazine, that year many of the Tiger-seeded funds were struggling.

References

{{Hedge funds Tiger Management Investment management companies of the United States Hedge fund firms in New York City 2000 disestablishments in New York (state) Defunct hedge funds Privately held companies based in New York City American companies disestablished in 2000 American companies established in 1980 Financial services companies disestablished in 2000 Financial services companies established in 1980