Bill Ackman and Pershing Square Capital Management

In 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic spread around the world, the American stock market crashed to such an extent that the entire market circuit breaker was activated 4 times in 10 days, and millions of people lost their funds.

Meanwhile, there were investors who anticipated a stock market crash. We obtained 2.6 billion dollars from an investment amount of only 27 million dollars, and realized a return of almost 100 times in just 1 month.

That investor is Bill Ackman, founder and CEO of a hedge fund called Pershing Square Capital Management.

Bill Ackman was born in 1966 to a wealthy Jewish family in Chappaqua, New York.

After receiving a bachelor's degree from Harvard University in 1988, he went on to Harvard Business School and obtained an MBA.

After working with his father in the real estate business, he founded his own hedge fund with Joel Greenblatt in 1992. The fund had a good track record, but they decided to close it in 2002.

Two years later, Ackman founded Pershing Square Capital Management L.P., with $54 million.

Ackman wasn't that active in media exposure. However, it became famous for its five-year sales spree against the nutraceutical manufacturer Herbalife. This incident became the documentary film “Betting on Zero.”

In 2012, Ackman sold a large amount of Herbalife stock short. He accused Haberife of being like an infinite chain chain, and insisted that its stock price would be zero.

However, another financier, Carl Icahn, took the opposite position and bought up shares of Herbalife in large quantities.

Their conversation escalated into an open dispute on the 2013 CNBC show.

In 2017, Herbalife's stock price surged 51% over the year. Early the next year, Ackman suffered heavy losses and withdrew from this dispute.

Bill Ackman, known as an “activist investor,” has been subject to strict scrutiny by the SEC (US Securities and Exchange Commission).

(Note: Activist investors who have become major shareholders tend to change corporate strategies and try to maximize their own shareholder value. In other words, they try to play a very active role in both the board of directors and management.)

However, in 2022/3, it was announced that he would retire from being an “activist” and “sales shower.” He said he is prepared to lead his company into the next era and is ready to focus on long-term, “quiet” betting.

Ackman likes to invest intensively and only holds 10 to 15 positions in his portfolio. Like Warren Buffett, Bill Ackman believes that excessive diversification will make investing inefficient. This is based on the belief that “if you have strong confidence in trading, you must boldly proceed.”