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1. Great book, highly recommended!
   Admittedly, I have been a fan of Greg’s for many years, principally his work at the Wall Street Journal, but also his first two books “The Greatest Trade Ever” as well as “The Frackers.” So I am partial to his work, as he is one of the few financial journalists who writes for professionals, but makes his work accessible to those who do not work on the Street or even those that do not have a financial background. He is one of the few who can thread that delicate needle.This summer I plowed through his most recent work “The Man Who Solved the Market” as I became deeply engrossed in the subject matter and decided that it wasn’t “above my head or pay grade at all”. I must admit that I didn’t just polish it off immediately when I first got it as I was a bit intimidated as initially he goes through the bios of some of the initial mathematicians/scientists working for/with Simons (Baum, Ax, Berlekamp, Laufer, etc) and briefly discusses concepts such as kernels, stochastic differential equations, hidden Markov models, etc. which just made my eyes glaze over as I am an opportunistic, discretionary trader, and not quant/systematic. Even in Greg’s acknowledgements he writes he never got past pre-calculus in HS (me just calculus II in college–and that was >15 years ago)! So that stuff was admittedly dense and arcane for a neophyte wishing to engage in that subject matter, yet I like and appreciate the way he explained those complex mathematical terms both in a way that a layman like myself could understand it, but also not in a way so as to not insult the intelligence of other readers who may be quants who are intimately familiar with this subject material. But it was a well done book that gave the reader as close a look as an outsider is going to get as to how RenTec does what it does.I especially enjoyed these 2 quotes: “What you’re really modelling is human behavior. Humans are most predictable in times of high stress–they act instinctively and panic. Our entire premise was that human actors will react the way humans did in the past…we learned to take advantage.” & “We make money from the reactions people have to price moves.”It started off with a great bio of Simons (I especially liked the part about how him and his friend were traveling cross-country following college, and they stopped for a swim in MS, and upon asking why there were no African-Americans there, was told they weren’t allowed–and how this was a seminal moment in shaping his future political beliefs as well as his philanthropy in both autism and math education). And then of course Medallion itself, I mean wow, absolutely incredible returns, especially after Bob Mercer and Peter Brown join (say what you will about Mercer–and Greg includes some of these salacious details–but apparently he got the job done. I enjoyed his quote, “We get 50.75% of our trades right, but of that 50.75%–we get 100% of that right. And you can make billions that way.” Now that’s a baller quote (regardless of the politics, with which of course I abhorrently disagree). And the returns speak for themselves: 66.1% gross, 39.1% net over the 30 years from 1988-2018 (I can only imagine how much it cleaned up 1H20 during the COVID crisis.) So it was an outstanding job straddling the fine line between making this book both accessible, but still very high-level and informative (just as his two other books “The Greatest Trade Ever” and “The Frackers” are, as well his work for WSJ). I highly recommend it.

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2. Worthwhile Investment History
   I enjoyed Mr. Zuckerman’s effort very much – it was a book I didn’t particularly want to put down and it makes for a fun and quick read. Think folks would do well to consider their perspectives/objectives for the book. I’m not primarily a professional money manager, have an M.S. in finance but no advanced training in complex mathematics. I think quantitative rules-based investing systems have significant value. I came to the book under no illusion that it was going to reveal any “secrets” that could be put into action and that held true. But I found it to be a nicely done history of quantitative investing & how technology enabled the scale and complexity. Here are some specific notes:1. I’m not sure the title does justice to the book or to participants. There’s no doubting the obscenely amazing performance of the Medallion funds. Mr. SImons, as founder and CEO, certainly has earned a large place in financial history. But while the book does a terrific job communicating Mr. Simons’ early work as a cryptographer & his academic achievements in respect of geometers etc., it seems to describe a man who had a vision for how the market might be solved & drove the funding/infrastructure for realization – but not a man who actually developed the specifics of the fund’s model. It really seems to be several of the other key characters who poured endlessly over pricing history, identified & tested anomalies and wrote the algorithmic codes (beginning with commodities & fixed income, equities later on).2. The author does a very good job, IMHO, of discussing concepts like factor investing, statistical arbitrage, paired trades, hedges, market neutral, etc. And he takes the time to nicely reference some of the underlying math for those who have the interest, touching on concepts ranging from differential equations to mean reversion to Brownian motion to embedded Markov processes. The author doesn’t purport to try and teach readers how they might use those ideas – appropriately so – but it’s meaningful perspective.3. Not surprisingly, there’s a dichotomy re “how” the market was “solved.” There won’t be much new here for traders. At the broadest level of generality, certain pricing anomalies were identified & incorporated into algorithms that turned the raw data into trading signals. Harnessing computing power, the fund trades a ton, such that it doesn’t need to make much on each trade and only needs to get it right a bit over half the time – returns are then amplified by liberal employment of leverage; the systematic model is trained – application of machine learning – to continue to improve precision on its own and to determine trades/positions. Beyond that, though – & it shouldn’t be folks’ expectation- the book doesn’t go granular on the model’s inputs. It can’t and doesn’t give away the particulars of the black box. The author should be credited for his tackling of the funds’ initial problems with slippage and for reporting on how the funds had no choice but to move into equities in order to attain such massive AUM. Also great history on early and superior efforts to obtain/recreate pricing data & good discussion of the core fund’s preference for extremely short holding periods.4. There’s some pretty riveting investing history here, ranging from early developments in technical analysis to the long and steady rise of fundamentals-based investing to the profound skepticism with which systematic quant trading was treated for an exceptionally long time.5. The narrative is at times beautiful , at others choppy and abrupt. Probably too many cases of basically “the fund was in trouble” to “the fund was thriving”. It’s like, “oh, that’s good”6. In terms of personal biography, my understanding is that Mr. Simons is intensely private – under those constraints, the author does well in tracing his life and career, though for me, a truly strong and well developed portrait remains elusive. The author comes closer to that mark in telling the stories of several of the other key participants in the firm’s rise over time.7. Later in the book, a ton of space is devoted to Robert Mercer’s public politics and how it impacted the firm. I thought it was interesting stuff, but some may find it loses focus, e.g. there’s quite a bit on Rebekah Mercer that just doesn’t have much relation to the core story.This was an ambitious endeavor and Mr. Zuckerman should be credited for that. As personal biography, it’s s fine effort. As financial history, I’d characterize it as informative, accessible and entertaining. But I’m not sure I’d say it’s of huge importance. The telling of the story isn’t, in my view, likely to have any real impact on the methods and practice of finance. But for finance junkies, there’s a ton of on point info, perspective, teaching and fun. Thanks much to the author.

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3. Great read!
   Interesting, well worth the time spent. Inspirational, as I continue to study data analytics. Highlights the value of a strong foundation in mathematics ( which I will need to improve, personalla

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4. Jim Simon’s brilliant creative mind and many achievements are well described in this entertaining book. A man ahead of his time whose impact can be felt today in many circles.

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5. Excelente libro sobre la anécdota de como los fisicos dominaron wall street, necesario leer para replantearnos nuestro papel en el mercado

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6. Além da envergadura da biografia de Simons, que todos que tiveram algum contato com, seja através da imprensa ou por seus números de performance estrondosos, conheciam ou ao menos imaginavam, não podemos deixar de nos surpreender positivamente com a qualidade do material como um todo, demandou muito esforço e pesquisa , algo realmente surpreendente. Ainda nessa linha, observações feitas em relação a qualidade do livro tornam-se indissociáveis com a qualidade do escritor, digno de um campeão de literatura. Por outro lado, se vc espera encontrar no livro um guia para ganhar dinheiro, uma espécie de tutorial, esqueça, vc está no filme errado; mas se for para dar uma luz de qual caminho deva seguir, aí sim , vc encontrou o lado certo.

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7. Good read

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8. highly readable book

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