Jim Simons has died

https://www.simonsfoundation.org/2024/05/10/simons-foundation-co-founder-mathematician-and-investor-jim-simons-dies-at-86/

by fgblanch • 2 years ago

1143 317 2 years ago

simonsfoundation.org

seper8• 2 years ago

https://youtu.be/QNznD9hMEh0?si=XrLiIDUV4WMfIz2V

Interesting Numberphile interview with Jim, if you're not aware who he is

k8sToGo• 2 years ago

Link seems to be broken. I can’t see anything

OutOfHere2• 2 years ago

Same here, but it works in a private window.

gnatman• 2 years ago

His interview on Numberphile is great- very smart guy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNznD9hMEh0

imranq• 2 years ago

"My algorithm has always been: You put smart people together, you give them a lot of freedom, create an atmosphere where everyone talks to everyone else. They're not hiding in the corner with their own little thing. They talk to everybody else. And you provide the best infrastructure. The best computers and so on that people can work with and make everyone partners"

adversaryIdiot• 2 years ago

if only more companies fostered the idea of employee wellbeing

mycologos2• 2 years ago

A somewhat cynical take is that "smart people" is doing a lot of work here. If you get to restrict your hiring to people who have proven themselves to be world-class in something, they are probably much more likely to respond to freedom by pursuing something than by coasting (or worse).

richrichie7• 2 years ago

Employee wellbeing is overrated.

In fact, standard economic theory would say that it is better to pay people more instead doing anything else.

jetrink• 2 years ago

create an atmosphere where everyone talks to everyone else.

The company is an interesting example of Conway's Law[1]. I learned from the recent Acquired episode on RenTech[2] that in contrast to how most other firms work, there is only a single model within RenTech that everyone contributes to. You don't have a bunch of small teams working in silos building specialized or competing models. As a result, every new development gets shared with the whole group.

1. [O]rganizations which design systems are constrained to produce designs which are copies of the communication structures of these organizations.

2. https://www.acquired.fm/episodes/renaissance-technologies

ldjkfkdsjnv2• 2 years ago

The reality is that most extremely wealthy people are very far on the right tail of intelligence. People exist that can predict the market, they are just very rare.

questinthrow2• 2 years ago

While mister Simons might not be the best example, I sometimes feel that you can easily beat the market if you are well connected and have access to information that can move the markets before anyone else. For example how much know-how do you need to beat the market if you're a US senator? You know before anyone else what's going to happen regarding policy and can plan accordingly. There were rumours about this even regarding Simons' Medallion fund. About how all the talk about math and algorithms was just a red herring to divert from the fact that it was mostly insider knowledge that did the heavy lifting. Alas these rumours were never confirmed as far as I know.

choilive• 2 years ago

"There are 3 ways to make a living in this business: be first, be smarter or cheat" - Margin Call

infecto7• 2 years ago

That kind of theory is the same as chemtrails are real.

Insider trading exists but the amount of secrecy to make that theory a reality would be unobtainable.

TeaBrain3• 2 years ago

One can make any sort of outlandish claim, but there's little point in giving undue attention to entirely baseless speculation.

instagib• 2 years ago

Whether it’s a scam or not, I’ve seen a couple .onion sites for trading insider knowledge. You have to tell something to get in.

Beating the S&P 500 is difficult and there are now zero fee funds to mimic it.

paulpauper19• 2 years ago

You have no clue, sorry. Insider trading cannot generate the consistency and returns as RenTec does. Even insider traders lose money if the market does not react as expected.

There are tons of strategies out there that does not involve insider trading or fraud. One such example is simply shorting Bitcoin at the market open whilst going long QQQ. This has paid a lot , like today , in which Bitcoin is down 3% and QQQ down a tad. There are people running this strategy now which despite being public knowledge, is still profitable. Shorting bitcoin during market hours, in fact, realizes all of the downside of Bitcoin without the upside from shorting it.

There are other strategies like this. now imagine you assemble the greatest minds in the world and tons of computing power to find many strategies and run them 24-7.

blackhawkC17• 2 years ago

I’m doubting. Simons might be an exception given that he got a PhD in maths at age 23. He was always smart, and I think he was bound to excel in whatever field he chose.

But people don’t need be extremely smart to get wealthy. Just executing well on a simple idea can make one extremely wealthy, and there’s considerable luck involved. There’s also the need to have persuasive skills, connections, charisma, and all that to convince people to follow their vision, aka Steve Jobs and Elon Musk.

samatman• 2 years ago

Both of the people you mention are/were fairly obviously of high intelligence. A conservative lower bound would be the top 5%.

As intelligent as Jim Simons? Almost certainly not.

paulpauper19• 2 years ago

It's like a snowball effect. If something does not 'take' no amount of IQ or connections will help.

csours• 2 years ago

People exist that can predict the market, they are just very rare.

It's not hard to predict the market. It's hard to beat the market.

I can very easily predict that Tesla will continue to lose share price (as one example). I cannot use that prediction to make money.

As they say, "It's Priced In"

paulpauper19• 2 years ago

If by prediction you mean a statement in which there is nothing at stake, yes, anyone can do that

paulpauper19• 2 years ago

Not sure why this was downvoted. IQ almost certainly plays a large role. Why do these top quant firms so aggressively filter for IQ, like puzzles and test scores?

tromp• 2 years ago

The news item is blocked by many ad-blockers, including my Brave browser. Using Firefox I see the text:

Simons Foundation Co-Founder, Mathematician and Investor Jim Simons Dies at 86 By Thomas Sumner May 10, 2024 Simons Foundation co-founder and chair emeritus Jim Simons. © Béatrice de Géa

It is with great sadness that the Simons Foundation announces the death of its co-founder and chair emeritus, James Harris Simons, on May 10, 2024, at the age of 86, in New York City.

Jim (as he preferred to be called) was an award-winning mathematician, a legend in quantitative investing, and an inspired and generous philanthropist.

Together with his wife, Simons Foundation chair Marilyn Simons, he gave billions of dollars to hundreds of philanthropic causes, particularly those supporting math and science research and education. In 1994, they established the Simons Foundation, which supports scientists and organizations worldwide in advancing the frontiers of research in mathematics and the basic sciences.

Jim was active in the work of the Simons Foundation until the end of his life, and his curiosity and lifelong passion for math and basic science were an inspiration to those around him. He was determined to make a meaningful difference in the level of support that mathematics and basic sciences received in the United States, notably by sponsoring projects that were important but unlikely to find funding elsewhere.

Over its 30-year history, the Simons Foundation’s work has led to breakthroughs in our understanding of autism, the origins of the universe, cellular biology and computational science. Jim and Marilyn’s giving continues to support the next generation of mathematicians and scientists at schools and universities in New York City and around the world.

Jim frequently said that he went through three phases in his professional life: mathematician, investor and philanthropist. He previously chaired the math department at Stony Brook University in New York, and his mathematical breakthroughs during that time are now instrumental to fields such as string theory, topology and condensed matter physics.

In 1978, Jim founded what would become Renaissance Technologies, a hedge fund that pioneered quantitative trading and became one of the most profitable investment firms in history. He then turned his focus to making a difference in the world through the Simons Foundation, Simons Foundation International, Math for America and other philanthropic efforts.

“Jim was an exceptional leader who did transformative work in mathematics and developed a world-leading investment company,” says Simons Foundation president David Spergel. “Together with Marilyn Simons, the current Simons Foundation board chair, Jim created an organization that has already had enormous impact in mathematics, basic science and our understanding of autism. The Simons Foundation, an in-perpetuity foundation, will carry their vision for philanthropy into the future.”

Jim Simons is survived by his wife, three children, five grandchildren, a great-grandchild, and countless colleagues, friends and family who fondly recall his genuine curiosity and quick wit.

We know that many people have stories, messages and memories they would like to share about Jim. Please send them to observing@simonsfoundation.org.

Information on memorial services and other events honoring Jim’s life and legacy will be posted on the Simons Foundation website.

i13e• 2 years ago

At least for me, even with adblock turned off it still doesn't appear. Thank you for reposting!

elorant3• 2 years ago

I highly recommend the book "The Man Who Solved the Market" by Gregory Zuckerman which explains how Simons build his infamous company.

https://www.amazon.com/Man-Who-Solved-Market-Revolution/dp/0...

pibefision• 2 years ago

+1 for this book. It's a great way to understand what he did.

topherPedersen2• 2 years ago

I started reading the last chapter this afternoon.

paulpauper19• 2 years ago

infamous implies bad.

elorant3• 2 years ago

Well it’s an algo trading company.

hasante• 2 years ago

Damn! - with all anyone has to say - thats really sad to hear.

tombert9• 2 years ago

Sadly I've never been able to snag an interview with RenTech (and I've applied like a dozen times), but they're the ones that actually made me start taking finance a lot more seriously. Maybe if I ever finish my PhD they'll hire me.

I had previously thought of HFT and Quant as a bunch of "finance bros", and kind of dismissed it as "not real CS" [1]. Reading about RenTech and Jim Simons made realize that there's actually a lot of really cool and interesting math and CS that goes into this stuff.

Jim Simons being a respected mathematician who just decided to change trajectories has always fascinated me, and it's sad that he's gone.

[1] I don't believe this anymore and I feel dumb for thinking it in the first place.

filoleg• 2 years ago

His whole RenTech story was fascinating.

Effectively an outsider in finance who gathered a bunch of other outsiders (aka big mathematicians), and decided to start a hedge fund that takes zero interest in the actual companies and trades solely on math. Which makes sense, since none of the main people involved in its creation had any corporate or finance experience, but tons of math experience and knowledge.

This is oversimplifying it like crazy, but I recommend anyone to anyone with even a passing curiosity for this look up the details (or read “The Man Who Solved The Market”, which is documenting the beginnings and growth of RenTech, as well as that of Simons; very enjoyable read).

tombert9• 2 years ago

Yep, not argument here at all, RenTech is a super fascinating outlier in finance.

It's kind of inspiring. I don't know a ton about finance or trading algorithms, but I know a fair bit (I think) about math and CS, and because of RenTech I've formulating my own trading strategies (just paper trades). Thus far all I've been able to do is lose all my pretend money by trying to play options, but it's still fun to try.

Will I be successful and make billions? Almost certainly not, but it's an excuse to play with different types of math that I don't play with very often, but RenTech proved that you can beat the market by taking advantage mathematics.

1024core• 2 years ago

IIRC his fund averaged around 30% gains per year, every year, over 30 years. (I'm going from memory here, too lazy to look it up). That is just such an unbelievable performance number.

_vaporwave_• 2 years ago

“The Man Who Solved The Market” is fascinating because it spans almost the entire history quantitative finance (through the lens of RenTech) dating back to the 1970s.

Simmons was one of the first to realize the advantage of collecting and analyzing vast sums of data to identify patterns in financial markets. They were digitizing magnetic tapes and collecting more data than they could even process given technical limitations of the time.

gcanko• 2 years ago

When I read "The Man Who Solved The Market”, I blown away with the story of Robert Mercer who arguably paved the way for Brexit and the election of Donald Trump. I wonder how different the world would be if Simmons didn't exist, the butterfly effect can sometimes have some massive unintended consequences.

real0mar• 2 years ago

Does the book cover anything about how the fund actually works? It's understandable that they'd want to keep a tight lid on it, but I'm so curious

PaulHoule4• 2 years ago

I remember the time that I went to a conference put on by Sun Microsystems in the early 2000s and asked a question about certain hardware being good for main memory databases which got me jumped on by a RenTech recruiter. Had I known what was about to happen to my current job at that time (mentioned in another comment in this thread) I would have taken more interest.

karmakurtisaani3• 2 years ago

RT must be one of the most selective companies in the world. Even to get an interview you'd better have a damn good CV (medals in math/cs/science Olympiads, degree from a top tier school etc.). And then after a few years of working there you're a (multi)millionaire. It's totally bonkers.

tombert9• 2 years ago

I don't really blame them for not picking me, clearly whatever they've been doing has been working. I'm not entitled to a job from them, obviously. I don't really know what a "top tier" university is, but I can say for sure that my undergrad (WGU) wouldn't count as that.

The PhD I'm in is from a more prestigious university [1], and I guess FAANG experience isn't enough to snag an interview with them.

[1] University of York, though I don't know if that counts as "top tier" either.

belter2• 2 years ago

That is what they said about Google....

paulpauper19• 2 years ago

I read you do not apply, rather you get recruited.

mhh__• 2 years ago

When have high frequency traders and quants ever been finance bros? Wut?

tombert9• 2 years ago

Again, I was wrong and I acknowledged that, but I guess I grouped HFT and Quants into the same camp as the characters from American Psycho.

They're different groups, I respect them now and feel dumb for not respecting them before.

kqr• 2 years ago

The very early quants (people who did rough mental options math in the Chicago pits in the 1970s) were finance bros by osmosis. You had to be.

It changed at some point during the '80s, probably to no little degree thanks to Renaissance.

rcpt• 2 years ago

The phone screen was hard and I didn't pass. It's not usual tech interviews they hit you with a lot of stats and math GRE style questions. Maybe the prep in finance is different

infecto7• 2 years ago

They don't really hire finance people so I suspect most/all of the interview processes are heavy on the match/stat side.

amelius• 2 years ago

I have to confess that I still think that. Where would you recommend I start reading to find financial enlightenment?

tombert9• 2 years ago

I think Veritasium made a really good video talking about some of the differential equations governing option pricing [1] which I found really fascinating. Patrick Boyle's video about Jim Simons' history is really interesting too [2].

Also just reading about Jim Simons' being an already-very-successful mathematician dropping everything to start a hedge fund and ending up extremely successful at the end of it was a bit of a wakeup call. Clearly this was an extremely smart dude (he was the chair of the math department at Stony Brook!), and so if this is interesting enough for someone like him, then it's probably something worth looking into.

I read through a book on basic trading strategies and I thought it was pretty interesting [3], though I've gone in a pretty different direction from what they taught.

[1] https://youtu.be/A5w-dEgIU1M

[2] https://youtu.be/xkbdZb0UPac

[3] https://www.amazon.com/Machine-Learning-Algorithmic-Trading-...

sergius• 2 years ago

You should read these books:

https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/43889703

https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/25733505

And some of the myths you have may be dispelled :-)

phyalow• 2 years ago

Both are excellent, I'll add these two too:

https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/186124

https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/482347

buggythebug• 2 years ago

Why would you think it was a bunch of "finance bros"? You can BS your way to the top in such things as Sales because raw intellect and mental ability is not required. The same can be said for many aspects of finance. But you can't just do HFT or Quant because you want to - you actually need skills. Same way I can't BS my way into designing a rocket - you either can or you can't.

kwere• 2 years ago

Being able to BS yourself upward is a skill in itself. Management becomes "political" up the ladder

tombert9• 2 years ago

Because I didn't know what they actually did, I assumed it was just another rebranding of the same seemingly-useless stuff that I associated with finance bros.

I mentioned in the very comment that you're replying to that I was wrong.

markgall3• 2 years ago

Will be interesting to see how this affects math research. He has pumped unthinkable amounts of money into the field. The only first-class flights I've taken in my life were to get to Simons-funded conferences at super fancy hotels. (I found these conferences a bit ridiculous, but the luxury treatment did ensure that they could get together a lot of the biggest names in the field in one place.)

Besides the conferences, there is the SCGP at Stony Brook, the Simons Center in Manhattan, whatever MSRI is called now, AMS-Simons travel grants, tons of money for the arXiv, the Magma license deal... and that's just the stuff that I've benefited from personally. I know there's more, Simons Collaboration grants and probably other things I've never heard of. He was very good to us all.

We've always joked that Phds in geometry-adjacent fields have to have one of the highest average incomes of any degree, probably at least $1 million a year. Simons making $3 billion, the rest of us making 90k apiece.

PaulHoule4• 2 years ago

That money for the arXiv was a decade late. arXiv barely survived the 2000s.

renewiltord2• 2 years ago

Ah, good looking out. It was on my list for this year https://info.arxiv.org/about/donate.html but if it's useless I'll skip it. More for GiveWell it is.

infecto7• 2 years ago

That money for the arXiv was a decade late. arXiv barely survived the 2000s.

I find this kind of comment quite distasteful on someones death. Was he actively trying to destroy arXiv?

soperj• 2 years ago

That's a strange sentiment, it's not like he had to donate at all?

77pt776• 2 years ago

How difficult is to run a glorified BBS over HTTP/HTML like that?

Like seriously?

It's not as difficult as the stuff being published there.

1980phipsi• 2 years ago

Quanta Magazine is also funded by his foundation.

markgall3• 2 years ago

Good point! Far and away the best popularization of recent results, at least in the eyes of a mathematician.

max_3• 2 years ago

Even the Numberphile YouTube Channel.

He was very serious about improving maths education and actually did alot.

nextos• 2 years ago

And lots of great work in quantitative biology, which is hard to get funded elsewhere.

frinxor• 2 years ago

came here to mention this as well! fantastic ezine that i click everytime i see it linked here.

mycologos2• 2 years ago

Hopefully the Simons empire has enough people who will keep executing his vision and stave off bureaucratic rot.

Making money is one thing, but circulating so much of it back through math and science is a great legacy.

hinkley3• 2 years ago

I wonder if he left any of the rest of his money to the foundation, or if it all stays with his family.

altruios4• 2 years ago

sadly, the trend for these sorts of things is to sour after the original founder leaves...

There is an esoteric concept that has some dynamics that explain this phenomenon somewhat. Not to get to into the weeds (the origins of this concept are esoteric religious ideas - I mean this secularly, as it relates to business entities) but the concept is an 'egregore'

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egregore#:~:text=An%20egregore....

I don't see it on the Wikipedia page, but the theory that explains the degradation of a companies original mission statement can be summarized as this: "Within an organization(egregore) there exists three classes of individuals... the primary two of which are those that serve in the name of the egregore, and those that serve the egregore directly, the third (a smaller %) being those un-loyal to the current structure and would change the egregore to suit their needs. Of the main two: The dichotomy can be spilt along lines like developers/founders vs marketers/sales, where developers are interested in serving the mission statement and developing a good product, and marketers are interested in growth and survival, at the expense of everything else. So when the developers/founders leave, the vacuum that is created is filled either by those that would change the egregore, or corrupt the mission statement in the name of growth and profit."

This is a simplistic model - with a fair bit of predictive and explanatory power. I have found it useful to describe that shift inside a corporation.

qq66• 2 years ago

The thing is that he genuinely loved math. I don't think there's really anyone in his orbit who loves math as much. His family is his family and his colleagues love money.

We'll see in the coming months and years whether he was able to create a structure that continues his legacy but usually the answer to that question is no.

bmitc3• 2 years ago

For what it's worth, the foundation was actually kickstarted by his wife.

wslh• 2 years ago

It is not about enough people, it is about THE PERSON. Every people is different and there are people who are more different and outliers.

eru9• 2 years ago

Hopefully the Simons empire has enough people who will keep executing his vision and stave off bureaucratic rot.

I think that fear is why the Gates foundation (or was it the one by Buffett or both?) have to spend down their endowment within a few years of the founder's death and then close shop.

squirrel6• 2 years ago

Not to mention Math for America, which is one of the best funded organizations of its kind…

markgall3• 2 years ago

Another important one! I think they pump a lot of money into the MoMath as well. It's just hard to come up with every way the math world depends on Simons money.

hinkley3• 2 years ago

His wife also helps run the foundation doesn’t she? Looks like she’s ~73 so hopefully has a few years left.

hinkley3• 2 years ago

Geeze, phrasing. I meant "a few years of actively supporting the foundation", not "let's start a death clock."

pyrrhotech2• 2 years ago

73 is less than a decade into retirement age; hopefully she has much more than a few! Looks like 14.5 years life expectancy

infinet• 2 years ago

Been a mathematician, he also funds physics. See Simons Observatory that studies Cosmic Microwave Background.

abhgh2• 2 years ago

I wasn't aware of this till a friend told me: the Simons foundation partly also funds the Perimeter institute [1].

[1] https://perimeterinstitute.ca/news/new-simons-foundation-sup...

hx2a• 2 years ago

I believe Jim Simons is also one of the founders behind the National Museum of Mathematics in NYC.

https://momath.org/

next_xibalba2• 2 years ago

found these conferences a bit ridiculous

Was it the content/aims of the conferences, or just that they were so ostentatiously luxurious?

spr-alex• 2 years ago

this was posted down into the comments already but geometry has nothing to do with https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/02/business/renaissance-irs-...

the simons foundation will have influence on machine learning and medicine for many decades to come though and will hopefully be a force of positivity in these fields

lupire3• 2 years ago

Simons was a geometer.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/1970273?origin=crossref

ev7• 2 years ago

And the Simons Institute for the Theory of Computing at Berkeley!

jasondigitized• 2 years ago

He was worth an ungodly amount of money. His foundation or whatever vehicle he chose will surely be around for a long time.

ilrwbwrkhv2• 2 years ago

This is what Elon musk could have been. Instead of that he became a 13 yr old guy.

xiaodai• 2 years ago

Magma. Only in the us. Sydney where it’s developed have to pay for it

mehulashah2• 2 years ago

This person made a lot of money, so it’s easy to say that he’s part of the machine. But, the man had principles. And he stood by them. Grateful for him showing us the way.

dcgudeman• 2 years ago

"the machine"? What is "the machine", the economy?

mehulashah2• 2 years ago

I meant the financial-industrial complex that dictates our economy.

jjallen• 2 years ago

He took money out of the machine and donated it to good causes. Arguably he was anti machine

77pt776• 2 years ago

Not only that.

He was intellectual honest and technically exceptional.

mushufasa• 2 years ago

Last month an amazing biographical podcast came out describing his personal journey to starting rentech, and the factors that make the business so competitive.

Certainly worth a listen https://www.acquired.fm/episodes/renaissance-technologies

Schiendelman• 2 years ago

This is by far my favorite podcast series, I’d recommend the ones on Costco, Amazon, and Nvidia as well.

arcanemachiner• 2 years ago

Acquired is amazing. They recently did one on Microsoft which is great too.

crakenzak• 2 years ago

Their Novo Nordisk one is really great too!

keiferski2• 2 years ago

Came here to recommend this. This podcast is a good overview for RenTech and their other episodes are good for other companies. Especially the Nintendo series.

They also did an interview with Charlie Munger right before he died. They have good...timing, for sure.

javiramos2• 2 years ago

The podcast seems like a death sentence. They did one on Charlie Munger and he died a few weeks after. Jim Simons also died a few weeks after his episode aired.

bcherny3• 2 years ago

I listen to Acquired religiously, but felt this particular episode was pretty weak. They went through Zuckerman's The Man Who Solved the Market [0] chapter by chapter, butchering a few parts because the hosts don't know quant finance well (though they seem to know VC and product very well).

I'd recommend just reading the book instead. I'd also recommend Derman's My Life as a Quant [1] for a broader take at other firms around the same time that Renaissance was taking off.

[0] https://a.co/d/6x7ALkr

[1] https://a.co/d/5vWBOce

mgfist5• 2 years ago

It's tough because of how little material is out there.

I will say, I thought their hypothesis on why the fees are so high was very astute. Can't know if it's true or not, but it feels very compelling.

ilrwbwrkhv2• 2 years ago

Really sad. I looked up to him. Trying to achieve brilliance in a field and then gathering a brilliant team and making money and then giving back is a great way to live.

chrispeel• 2 years ago

Archive link for original article: https://archive.ph/zIx9b

Simons also funded Quanta magazine: https://www.quantamagazine.org/about/

His Wikipedia page is interesting: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Simons_(mathematician)

SSLy• 2 years ago

thank you, the page renders empty for me.

justinclift• 2 years ago

Yeah, it's effectively a placeholder for me. No content whatsoever.

OutOfHere2• 2 years ago

What was the cause of death?

chronic6402014• 2 years ago

Old age

But probably smoking

georgehaake• 2 years ago

Pretty good run for an adult life-long heavy smoker.

painted-now• 2 years ago

I forgot which interview that was, but Jim mentioned that some folks are genetically less affected by smoking - and the he did such a test and he seems not to be affected by it and that this was the reason why he didn't stop.

mfiguiere• 2 years ago

Acquired Podcast did a 3 hours episode on the history of Renaissance Technologies last month.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KjW4BqNFy0

gregjw• 2 years ago

A true legend. RIP.

shashanoid• 2 years ago

Oh my god, may he rest in peace. I enjoyed listening to him

djoshea• 2 years ago

The Simons Foundation has had an enormous, transformative impact on neuroscience as well. It’s widely considered among the most incisive, forward-looking sources of funding in the field, pushing for fundamental advances to solve “tomorrow’s problems.” https://www.simonsfoundation.org/collaborations/#global-brai...

tremarley• 2 years ago

One of the most impactful men of our generation.

He will be remember for lifetimes

CliffStoll• 2 years ago

I'm personally grateful to Jim Simons -- and his foundation -- for supporting and extending mathematical research in Berkeley, and throughout the world.

Jim Simons did fundamental research in topology; his work in mathematics, cryptography, and topological quantum field theory.

Beyond this, he pressed for higher quality public education in math and encouraging training and presige for math teachers.

lvkv• 2 years ago

As an alum of Stony Brook, I’m grateful for all Jim Simons did for the university. Aside from having been the chairman of the math department, he’s the reason we have the Simons Center for Geometry and Physics, as well as the “Renaissance” School of Medicine. Not to mention his recent gift of $500 million—the largest unrestricted donation to a public university in American history. I’m sure there’s much, much more that he’s done that I’m not even aware of.

blackhaj7• 2 years ago

Anyone got a link to the rentec money machine source code? I fancy an early retirement.

Jokes aside, really sad to hear this. The guy did a lot of good with the money from what I understand

Smaug123• 2 years ago

(If the source were available to you, then it would be available to all the other funds, and so it would instantly stop making money.)

paulpauper19• 2 years ago

It is not just one source. probably constant revision

22SAS• 2 years ago

I work at a trading firm. RIP to the GOAT, the god of quants.Reading about him and RenTec, back in high school, was one of the first things that got me attracted to the field.

brcmthrowaway• 2 years ago

RenTech is a CIA front company

rustcleaner2• 2 years ago

Sounds like bull... I'll take three!

helsinki• 2 years ago

max_3• 2 years ago

He was writing his memoir.

I really hope he finnished it, I was looking forward to reading it.

rybosworld2• 2 years ago

I might be naive but it seems unfortunate that so many bright minds end up using their talents to catch trillions of pennies in the financial markets.

thrdbndndn• 2 years ago

What you said might be true, but he's like THE outlier of this trope though.

creer• 2 years ago

He did a few other things also. RenTech didn't even require all his time.

jjtheblunt2• 2 years ago

Your comment just made me wonder if the catching of those trillions of pennies makes the markets more efficient.

(Not an economist, and I don't pretend to know.)

rybosworld2• 2 years ago

I think the efforts do make the markets more efficient, and it would be hard to argue the opposite.

I'm just wondering out loud if that's a meaningful use of such a large percentage of top talent. I'm not faulting anyone who chooses to go that way. There's a lot of money to be made. To me, it seems unfortunate that we don't better incentive pursuit of science/engineering.

This paper breaks down how many people from top schools (MIT, Yale, Harvard) get jobs in finance. It's between 20-30% of the graduating class every year.

https://www.hbs.edu/ris/Publication%2520Files/16-067_3d306ef...

paulpauper19• 2 years ago

dumb comment. he did more than that. consider his catching pennies helped others who chose other vocations.

mlsu• 2 years ago

Don't think about the money. Money flows in one direction, but corporate decisions, organization of resources, manufacturing activity -- real physical flows, energy flows, mass flows -- move opposite. What "finance" really is is improving allocation of those real resources, and then skimming a little bit off of the improvement. Fundamentally, money is a signal for the expenditure of energy. The flow of money, the signal, can be analyzed and applied optimally to improve the expenditure of energy.

If the world's production capacity is a giant muscle, finance is like the brain. Spending 20 watts of brainpower to move a 100 watt muscle in the right way can be hugely effective, far more effective than a 1000 watt muscle with 5 watts of brain.

This is really what finance does. They improve the movement of the muscle.

nybsjytm5• 2 years ago

Sometimes people act like guys like Bill Gates or Elon Musk are coming from deep personal scientific knowledge and accomplishment, but they're absolutely nothing compared to Simons. His contributions to geometry in the 60s and 70s, from minimal surfaces to Berger's classification of special holonomy to Chern-Simons theory, were fundamental and are still well-remembered. His name would be known even if he'd never gone into finance or philanthropy.

lupire3• 2 years ago

Bill Gates did graduate study in math and computer science as a first-year undergraduate at Harvard College, and published the fastest pancake-sort algorithm (held the record for 30 years), before dropping not to start Microsoft. And of course he invented Microsoft's early technology, which advanced the state of the art. He was highly likely to be a great computer scientist if he chose to stay in school.

nybsjytm5• 2 years ago

I can read both the Gates-Papadimitriou paper and Simons' work, and it doesn't compare. Maybe Gates could have been a great scientist, who knows, but no matter how many advanced classes he took, he never was. It doesn't even matter if he got good grades in them.

paulpauper19• 2 years ago

Bill gates did math 55. legit smart guy

nybsjytm5• 2 years ago

You don't need to be a smart guy to take math 55, nor is 'being a smart guy' what I'm even talking about.

jeffhwang• 2 years ago

I was classmates with several people who did well in Math 55, and knew some people who were teaching fellows for it. Very smart folks but they themselves would not have compared themselves to Simons as mathematicians, esp. at age 18.

Tistel• 2 years ago

There is a nice book that goes into detail of his life called: "The Man Who Solved the Market: How Jim Simons Launched the Quant Revolution"

PartiallyTyped• 2 years ago

@dang may we have a black banner? thank you.

rustcleaner2• 2 years ago

Heads up: website breaks on Fennec with uBlock Origin turned on (and all filters enabled). Website unbreaks when uBlock Origin is turned off. Looks like a new way to punish uBlock.

rglover• 2 years ago

Sorry to hear this. RIP.

“Be guided by beauty. I really mean that. Pretty much everything I’ve done has had an aesthetic component, at least to me. Now you might think ‘well, building a company that’s trading bonds, what’s so aesthetic about that?’ But, what’s aesthetic about it is doing it right. Getting the right kind of people, and approaching the problem, and doing it right […] it’s a beautiful thing to do something right.”

- Jim Simons

xucian• 2 years ago

man's a genius, enjoyed each of his interviews. rip

77pt776• 2 years ago

This beauty talk really needs to think.

With the current status of research it's clear humans have a very problematic relation with what most people think the term means.

A new word should really be crafted to disambiguate.

gradschoolfail• 2 years ago

I have a feeling that when academics or high status people talk about beauty they actually mean “surprising depth”, because I find that both terms as used by these people subconsciously encode a notion that hard work is required, something not fully appreciated by most humans.. (although Simons does tip his hat to that with his “be guided by”.) Anyways high status and academics tend to forget, due to early quality education, that appreciation of the sort of beauty that they refer to is not costfree.

pm90• 2 years ago

https://www.wsj.com/articles/james-simons-robert-mercer-othe...

misiti3780• 2 years ago

RIP. He did a lot of great things w/ his life. Per the books about him, he was a life long smoker. Lucky he got to 86!

https://twitter.com/quant_arb/status/1631052354408665091?lan...

MP_17292• 2 years ago

Simmons is one of the greatest people and a true inspiration as a mathematician, even though my career drifted from academia. He and Andrew Wiles are the reason why I always say I am a mathematician, even though I work elsewhere.

RIP

77pt776• 2 years ago

Why do you admire Wiles so much?

MP_17292• 2 years ago

I read Simon Sigh during high schools and that was such a beautiful story of perseveration that I decided to do Math.

topherPedersen2• 2 years ago

I'm literally reading the last chapter of "The Man Who Solved the Market" right now. RIP

aborsy• 2 years ago

RIP. A good guy and a good foundation.

Anyone knows the cause of death?

georgehill• 2 years ago

He was a legend. RIP.

Maybe a black bar on top of HN?

goy• 2 years ago

One of the greatest. RIP

benreesman5• 2 years ago

What a loss. I hope I join the community in wishing the best for his loved ones.

But also what a life. He could have quit 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 years ago and been in the history books. What’s now called Chern-Simons is a monumental result in topology that IIRC dates to the mid-60s.

Then he empirically disproved the strong-form EMH, a result in economics of which I’m unaware of any peer in its conclusiveness.

Then he built SUNY Stoneybrook into possibly the best lab for topology and differential geometry in the world.

Geometer, topologist, cryptographer, outspoken and fearless critic of needless war, trader, teacher, monument.

Legend. May he rest.

benreesman5• 2 years ago

@dang I think this merits a black bar.

anonu• 2 years ago

Then he empirically disproved the strong-form EMH

Not clear as we do not really know exactly how RenTech works. It is believed that there are substantial tax loopholes that were taken advantage of - which would go a long way (not all the way) to explaining the incredible performance of his fund.

benreesman5• 2 years ago

Every serious finance company knows how to optimize taxes.

Simons was returning 25-50% on 8BN AUM at Medallion every year with one or two exceptions every year for 30 years.

Even the hedge funds we let openly operate with black edge in plain sight can rarely do that for 3-5 years.

It’s obviously debatable unless they open the books, but it’s pretty much common knowledge which funds are bending the rules (flagrantly violating securities law), and I’m unaware that Medallion was anything other than just there first.

richrichie7• 2 years ago

Rentec gets a lot of leverage and gets ridiculous pricing on option trades from the banking desks because of the flow they bring.

philshem• 2 years ago

Here’s a New Yorker profile from 2017

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/12/18/jim-simons-the...

therobots9272• 2 years ago

I was lucky enough to see him speak at the Simons' Center for Geometry and Physics at Stony Brook as an undergrad, even though I had no idea what he was talking about (he was explaining the math behind the sculpture he had contracted for the university). He's always been an inspiration to me and I would strongly recommend (as other commenters already have) the book "The Man who Solved the Market" which gives the history of Renaissance Technologies. Whether it's his career in Math/Physics, or career in the stock market, he was at the top of the game. His contributions to the university in combination with his Philanthropic efforts to improve Math education are likely his greatest contributions to humanity. It's highly likely that my tuition was paid for by someone who worked for him at the Hedge Fund, or maybe even Simons himself. Rest In Peace Jim. :'(

hellooodarkness• 2 years ago

This is a huge loss for both the scientific community and the quant investing community!

bmitc3• 2 years ago

While I'm not one to fawn after billionaires, I found his life story and personality really fascinating. He really seemed to maintain a humble approach, and in the Numberphile interview, which is excellent, he really emphasized the notion of luck in success. He donated a ton of money in very targeted ways that have been extremely successful. I think because of his humble approach, lack of self-promotion, etc., he's a bit unknown outside certain circles, but his impact in certain areas has been big.

While I wish that our country didn't have to rely on billionaires spearheading initiatives, which often goes the wrong way, Simons was absolutely an example of one of the good ones.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNznD9hMEh0

seliopou• 2 years ago

I went to a Simons Foundation lecture in like 2014. The topic and speaker escapes me now, but at the reception beforehand there there was an old man smoking. At the time I indulged myself so I asked the guy that invited me if I could smoke there too. He said, "only Jim can smoke in here." And that's the first time I had any idea who Jim Simons was.

richrichie7• 2 years ago

Jim never gave a fuck and smoked even in investor meetings.

abhgh2• 2 years ago

This is sad news indeed. The Simons Institute [1] in the UC Berkeley campus has had a positive impact in my life in terms of the many high quality talks (both in terms of content and recording quality) that they continue to put up on YouTube [2], while making it free to attend in online or in person (you have to register online). My wife and I have attended quite a few of them in person, and for people like us who are interested in learning but have no direct line into academia, this was one of the few avenues where we could learn what various researchers and research groups were working on, and interact with them. I had heard of the Medallion fund before I was aware of the Simons Institute but I never put the two together till a comment, either here or on reddit, mentioned Jim Simons as the connection.

[1] https://simons.berkeley.edu/homepage

[2] https://www.youtube.com/@SimonsInstituteTOC

pyrrhotech2• 2 years ago

Tragic news; he was my personal inspiration for getting into algotrading and founding https://grizzlybulls.com. The ultimate counter-example to the Efficient Market Hypothesis. RIP

rossant• 2 years ago

So sad. He seamed like an extraordinary man.

wwarner• 2 years ago

A great scientist. Rest peacefully Prof Simons. He probably deserved the Nobel for Chern-Simons theory.

EMCymatics• 2 years ago

RIP.

He was a real cool guy.

LifeIsBio• 2 years ago

Just to add to the list of this Jim Simons did and funded, he also established the Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative (SFARI).

"SFARI’s mission is to improve the understanding, diagnosis and treatment of autism spectrum disorders by funding innovative research of the highest quality and relevance."

SFARI in turn funds a lot of foundational neurological and rare disease research, since autism is such a common phenotype.

nunez• 2 years ago

This is really sad. Simons definitely had some views I don't agree with, but he was one of the good ones overall.

Specifically, I hope the Simons Foundation continues to fund Math for America. My wife participated in this program, and it helped her become an excellent educator while also _significantly_ helping her financially.

kolistivra2• 2 years ago

what views of his do you disagree with?

sciencesama2• 2 years ago

Medallion fund

sciencesama2• 2 years ago

Need a tracker for medallion fund

sirobg• 2 years ago

Did he share some book recommendations?

javiramos2• 2 years ago

If you are interested in learning about the history of Rentech and Jim Simon’s life I highly recommend this podcast: https://www.acquired.fm/episodes/renaissance-technologies

doubloon• 2 years ago

RIP

thuum7• 2 years ago

RIP, I regularly read quanta magazine. It seems he has supported science a lot.

chirau• 2 years ago

you'd think Jim would get a black bar on this site.

What actually is the criteria? Or it just depends on how @dang is feeling.

Jim is a hero in science, data, computing and finance. What else did he need to do?

richrichie7• 2 years ago

I would not be surprised if RenTec had developed GPT way before OpenAI and kept mum about it.

sagasu007• 2 years ago

I hope there will be people who really like mathematics to inherit his legacy and continue on. The world cannot develop without mathematics

Wistar• 2 years ago

My favorite Simons interview.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNznD9hMEh0

Jim Simons has died

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