又一篇颠覆 "conventional wisdom" 的文章，只不过，这所谓的 "conventional wisdom" 其实是 business academia 的捏造。
其中有一段讲 hedge fund 头头 John Paulson （跟 Hank Paulson 不是亲戚）挺有意思的。Paulson 在 housing bubble 的浪尖上开始短房地产股票。
By 2004-05, Paulson was increasingly suspicious of the real-estate boom. He decided to short the mortgage market, using a financial tool known as the credit-default swap, or C.D.S. A credit-default swap is like an insurance policy.
In 2006, he had his firm undertake a rigorous analysis of the housing market, led by Paulson's associate Paolo Pellegrini. At that point, it was unclear whether rising housing prices represented a bubble or a legitimate phenomenon. Pellegrini concluded that housing prices had risen on average 1.4 per cent annually between 1975 and 2000, once inflation had been accounted for. In the next five years, though, they had risen 7 per cent a year—to the point where they would have to fall by forty per cent to be back in line with historical trends. That fact left Paulson certain that he was looking at a bubble.
"There's never been an opportunity like this," Paulson gushed to a colleague, as he made one bet after another. By "never," he meant never ever—not in his lifetime and not in anyone else's, either.
如果市场是 rational 的，就不会有那么多蠢货去买这些 "absurdly toxic mortgages"。芝加哥大学经济理论可以去死了。At one point, incredibly, Paulson got together with some investment banks to assemble bundles of the most absurdly toxic mortgages—which the banks then sold to some hapless investors and Paulson then promptly bet against. As Zuckerman points out, this is the equivalent of a game of football in which the defense calls the plays for the offense. It's how a nerd would play football, not a jock.
另外，故事中关于 Ted Turner 的一些部分也很有意思。虽然这篇文章的中心主题是讲 risk-taking 而不是讲 negotiation，但是从字里行间可以想象得出 Turner 在谈判桌上态度多么牛仔，手腕多么高明。
。。。但是学术的来说，这叫risk control, 光知道长期走向是不够的，要知道自己有多少资本承受力。拿别人的钱投资，回转余地不大的。