Steve Eisman

  • 21 Dec 2010 at 3:07 PM

Heads Up Play With David Einhorn

By

If you’re going to commit financial fraud, you probably don’t want to find yourself sitting at a table across from David Einhorn, who will know what you’re up to and share it with the world. Similarly, if you’ve never played poker and have only ever had a 15 minute tutorial on the game, you probably should avoid playing with the Greenlight Capital founder, whose vastly superior skills will demonstrate just how much you suck. As I like to live on the edge, yesterday in an undisclosed location, I choose not to heed the wisdom of the latter. Over several hands, Einhorn and I discussed the new edition of his 2008 book, “Fooling Some Of The People, All Of The Time.”

The latest version includes an epilogue, and concludes the story of Allied and Einhorn’s years of trying to get other people to listen when he said something was up. As we now know, Allied’s shares collapsed, Greenlight collected $35 million, and the hedge fund made another big (and correct) call on a bank called Lehman Brothers, whose failure was, according to Einhorn, “the Allied story all over again,” just on a bigger scale, with more resounding consequences. Even after the last crisis, which should have been a wake-up call, Einhorn doesn’t think we’ve changed much and if anything, the reforms passed only “encourage poor behavior and will likely foster an even bigger crisis.” He and I chatted about that exciting event, Quantitative Easing, Steve Eisman’s illicit pleasure of choice and more, plus poker tips for people who really, really need them.**

BL: You mentioned an unexpected and tremendous response from readers of the book the first time around. What’s the craziest piece of fan mail you’ve gotten- has anyone sent you their undergarments in the mail?
DE: [laughs] No, do you think they should?
BL: Sure.
DE: You’re hysterical.
BL: I mean, people do that. Musicians, rock stars get sent that sort of stuff. You’re like a rock star…of investing.
DE: Well, the thing is, my following [for the most part] is with 20 to 35 year old men. So, you know. I definitely don’t want their undergarments. Continue reading »

  • 02 Nov 2010 at 4:50 PM

FrontPoint Partners Received “Illegal Tips” From French Doctor

By

Earlier today French doctor Yves Benhamou was charged with passing on some hot info about Hepatitis C to an unnamed hedge fund, which didn’t seem to make any money off of the tip but avoided losing $30 million by a timely sale of six million shares of drug maker Human Genome Sciences. The fund was not named, but according to Matthew Goldstein at Reuters, it’s FrontPoint Partners, which has suspended a trader named Dr. Chip. Continue reading »

  • 29 Oct 2010 at 3:51 PM

Listen To Steve Eisman Tell Genworth Financial He’s Gonna Bring The Thunder

By

Earlier today we mentioned that FrontPoint Partners’ Steve Eisman has just about had it with Genworth Financial and told them as much on a conference call this morning in which he threatened to wage a proxy battle on their asses and throw management “out of here.” A clip has now been posted and the audio version is even better than reading in print (flashbacks to being yelled at by your father may ensue, particularly on the “DO NOT DO THAT” line). [Shareholder, Stevo enters around 38:14 and the juice is at 40:00]