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Hedge Fund Manager Cliff Asness Thinks Global Warming Much Ado About Nothing

Keeping his limited edition Captain America dolls in the original packaging? Big deal. Global warming? NBD.
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There are a lot of things that keep AQR founder Clifford S. Asness up at night: The Captain American shield tattooed to his bicep and the nagging, haunting feeling that he should've gone bigger. The level of security in his Greenwich office, and whether or not the prized action figures he keeps behind his desk are safe. Batman, and if he'll ever get to ride next him in the Batcycle's sidecar. Commenters on the internet. Big red dogs. Wine. The durability of his computer monitors. Right there alone represents hours of sheep counting and dozens of glasses of warm milk.

Luckily, there is at least one thing Cliff doesn't have to grapple with before getting some shut eye and that's the effects of global warming on the planet. The hedge fund manager recently put on his lab coat and determined the following:

His conclusion: It’s not as big of a problem as some suggest. Cliff Asness, who runs AQR, one of the largest hedge fund firms in the world, e-mailed out a research paper on Tuesday to reporters and others making his arguments on climate change. The paper is labeled “very preliminary,” and Asness asked that it not be directly quoted. The paper focuses on a chart of the Earth’s surface temperatures going back to 1880. Asness, who wrote the paper along with his co-worker Aaron Brown, does not deny that global temperatures are rising. But he says temperatures are rising at much slower rate than many suggest. What’s more, Asness and Brown say, based on the current pace of global warming, it will take another 500 years before the changes become a real problem.

...while others, who study these sorts of things for a living:

“I’m not sure about the idea of beating people about the head and shoulders, but within less than a year, you will look like complete fools (if you buy this crap),” e-mailed Columbia University environmental science professor James Hansen, who took a look at the Asness and Brown paper at Fortune’s request.

Top hedge fund manager: Global warming isn't a danger [Fortune]

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Exhibit A: Friday morning at AQR, August 10. Cliff Asness glanced pensively at a candy-colored array of Marvel superhero figurines lined up along his east-facing window. Spiderman. Captain America. The Hulk. Iron Man. Comic book heroes of his boyhood days on Long Island.--The Quants, by Scott Patterson, page 100. On an August morning, Asness walks to his sun-dappled office windowsill and picks up a Captain America action figure. The hedge-fund mogul owns a panoply of action heroes, from the Hulk to the Silver Surfer, and the comic books that spawned them.--Bloomberg Markets Magazine, October 7, 2010 "Hedge funds charge far too much in general by claiming to be geniuses," says Asness, lounging on a sofa in his corner office, surrounded by foot-high plastic models of comic book heroes.--Fortune, December 19, 2011 As a child, Clifford Scott Asness gave no sign of his future as a Wall Street tycoon. He was born in October 1966 in Queens, New York. When he was four, his family moved to the leafy suburban environs of Roslyn Heights on Long Island. In school Asness received good grades, but his interest in Wall Street didn’t extend beyond the dark towers of Gotham in the pages of Batman. Obsessed with little besides girls and comic books, Asness was a listless teenager, without direction and somewhat overweight. At times he showed signs of a violent temper that would erupt years later when he sat at the helm of his own hedge fund.--The Quants, by Scott Patterson, page 12. “His super-villains are intellectual dishonesty and ignorance,” says Jonathan Beinner, a managing director at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and a former classmate of Asness. “When someone offers an opinion that Cliff feels is incorrect or dishonest, whether it be related to investments, politics or pizza, he feels it is his duty to stand up, even if it’s not in his best interest.” Asness admits to a superhero complex. His favorite Marvel comic book character is Captain America, who gains strength with the help of a secret serum and whose shield can be used as an indestructible weapon. Asness has an image of the shield tattooed on his left arm.--Bloomberg Markets Magazine, October 7, 2010 Exhibit B: The above is a rendering of a Batcave that will soon be built in the home of an unnamed Greenwich resident. When it is completed in Novemeber, the spread will include "a Batcomputer, Batmobile, Batsuits, 180 degree film screen, sound effects, gargoyles and even a Bat-themed elevator." The problem? This guy is not only infringing on Asness's territory as resident super hero obsessive/aficionado/scholar-in-residence/neighbor who dresses up and role-plays his character of choice but is apparently too cowardly to show his face or reveal his name so that Cliff might confront him. The other problem? Captain America doesn't have some kind of cool underground lair setup of his own. The only recourse? Someone spends the next couple weeks writing a series of fan fiction that describes his house, and then spends $20 million to have that built. Greenwich Resident Building $2 Million Batcave In Home [CTNews] Dark Knight superfan spends $2MILLION creating home cinema replica of Bruce Wayne's cave [DM]

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Something you may or may not know about Cliff Asness is that by day, he is a hedge fund manager but by night he is the second coming of his hero, Captain America. Like the Captain, the AQR founder believes his duty is to defend America, only instead of fighting Axis Powers, Asness's enemies are liberal Commie Socialists hell-bent on destroying this country. Because his shield has been in the shop for repairs for the past couple years, Cliff has been forced to use other weapons to pummel his foes, namely writing amazingly witty1 emails to his friends and colleagues about how much Obama et al suck. Most recently, Captain Asness circulated "Some Useful Definitions to Understand Our Modern Progressive World," a little glossary of unalphabetized terms he put together sure to cut his adversaries deeply. (The Captain also helpfully pointed out in a footnote that many of the definitions were "written sarcastically as a faux left-winger, [while] some [are] just conservative/libertarian interpretations of what the left really means," in case that was lost on his audience.) They include: - The 1% Definition: Those who pay more than 1/3 the total federal income tax and are never thanked for it. More generally, they are responsible for all evil in the world today (unless they work in Hollywood or hitech in which case they are “honorary 99%-ers” regardless of income, tax rate, and lifestyle). - Cash for Clunkers Definition: What we came up to replace World War II as stimulus. Many perfectly good cars destroyed, no Nazis defeated. - Rights Definition: A more extreme form of “entitlement” defined above. Note that modern usage throws out the long tradition of natural rights only of a negative nature, that is, the right not to have something done to you, for rights of a positive nature, that is, the right to certain goods and services, like health care, Apple products, and soy milk. Since, no matter how important these items are, these modern positive rights must still be produced and taken from others, essentially the word “rights” now often stands for a system of slavery and theft.2 Some Useful Definitions [PDF] 1Definition: ... 2The fuck?

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Earlier today, Politico ran a story titled "Can Chuck Schumer win back Wall St. for Democrats?" Apparently the New York Senator recently "embarked on a fence-mending campaign with senior Wall Street executives, many of whom have grown furious with the Democratic party," in a charm offensive that has included "holding private dinners [including one put on by Pershing Square manager Bill Ackman], organizing high-end fundraisers for Democratic candidates and quietly pressing for super PAC donations." According to Politico, "the outreach appears to be working: Hedge fund and private-equity executives have held six different fundraisers for Democratic challengers and senators at Schumer’s request, sources say." Some financial services employees, however, are not so easy. Take Cliff Asness for example. The AQR manager happened to read the piece and here's what he had to say about it: From: Cliff Asness Sent: Tuesday, June 19, 2012 01:08 PM To: AQR lieutenants, other top hedge fund managers Subject: Can Chuck Schumer win back Wall St. for Democrats? Good title question. Only if Wall Street is so f---ing stupid as to defy credulity, honor, and morality. So, yeah, probably. Best line: “Chuck Schumer is pro-business". Yeah, ones that buy him off in explicit crony-capitalism, but he wants to regulate and tax to death ones that don't. Don Corleone was also pro-business. You guys say this stuff with a straight face huh? C p.s. Sorry about the multiple emails, merging lists (though that is probably not the thing that upsets people) While the above response should come as a shock to exactly no one, we don't think Schumer should give up on Asness so easily. The guy just wants to be wooed. Start with some limited edition action figures, add some $700 bottles of wine, and go from there.  You whip out a Mego Elastic Batman, he's listening. You show up with a a matching Captain America shield tattoo but instead of on your forearm it's on your face? He's nominating you for President. You're welcome.

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