How to win: Steve Cohen on markets and the Mets

Welcome to another episode of Goldman Sachs Exchanges, Great Investors. I'm Tony Pasquarello, global head of hedge fund coverage in Goldman Sachs' global banking and markets business. I recently had the great pleasure of sitting down with Steve Cohen, founder, CEO, and president of Point72. Steve is one of the world's greatest hedge fund managers, and he'd be on anyone's list of the most formidable traders of all time. We sat down in early June at Goldman Sachs' Apex Symposium where Steve discussed his path to investing, the traits that led to his investing success, and his broader views on th

go back to the very beginning. I don't even remember it. So

what was it that led you

to a career in the markets? Yeah. I mean, that's my interest in the market started really young. I had a grandparents that used to talk about stocks they owned. And when I was 12, 13, I'd read the sports page and then right to the next page was the stock exchange listings. And so I was sort of math oriented and just started looking at the prices, and and then I started hanging out in a brokerage firm in my hometown. I actually found a job right next to the brokerage firm. So I can go in there, and I used to sit there with the the old traders, and we just I I was 14 years old. Where was this wa

and go. You've seen a lot of money managers come and go. I've

seen a lot of traders come. So what

do you think are the traits that kind of correlate with those who've been successful? Well,

you gotta love it. I, you know, I used to say I couldn't wait. I hated my weekends. I couldn't wait to get to get into work Monday. I mean, because I just found the markets so dynamic and so exciting. And, and you gotta listen. You gotta have a process that you believe in. You know, whatever it is, you gotta have a core competency. And as long as you have that, a core competency, something you do well, keep doing it. And then you have to be adaptable. The market's changed. I mean, most of the people I was either hired or competing against in the nineties are not in business today because they

a huge amount of prominence today. Why do you think that is? Well,