David Tepper
Crisis periods offer enormous opportunities for traders. However, one category of investors loses enormous amounts of money during these times due to poor investment timing.
The second category makes billions of dollars by buying up shares and debt obligations of leading companies for pennies.
Investing in securities during times of crisis and financial difficulties is one of the most risky approaches, yet billions of dollars are made precisely in such market conditions.
David Tepper is considered one of these crisis virtuosos, having earned over $10 billion from the crisis. In this article, you will learn about his brief biography and success story.
David Tepper was born in 1957 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He grew up in a typical American family: his father was a corporate accountant, and his mother was an elementary school teacher.
However, despite his great potential for academic achievement, David was more interested in sports as a child and was considered a bully due to his rude behavior.
After graduating from high school, David Tepper chose to become an economist and enrolled in the University of Pittsburgh's economics department.
It's worth noting that the tuition fees were simply enormous, so he had to work part-time at the library and later at the stock exchange.
It's worth noting that, starting in his third year of study, David paid for his education entirely himself, as he was actively scalping options at the time.
Trader career
After graduating from university in 1978, David Tepper took a job as a junior analyst at Equibank.
However, the career path at his first job turned out to be far from Tepper's expectations, and it was at his first job that he realized he needed to continue his education.
So after two years of work and practical experience, David quit and went to study at Carnegie Mellon University business school and received an MBA.
After completing his training in 1982, David Tepper got a job at Ohio Republic Steel, where he became actively involved with so-called junk bonds.
After just a year at the company, he received a lucrative offer from Keystone Mutual Funds, where after two years of work he gained a reputation as the company's leading analyst.
In 1985, David Tepper got a job as a credit analyst at the largest investment bank, Goldman Sachs, earning only $150,000 a year.
It's worth noting that at Goldman Sachs, David Tepper was able to fully develop his talent as a manager; moreover, in a short period of time, he began to head an entire department for trading high-yield bonds.
However, David Tepper continually violated company regulations, so there was no talk of further promotion, despite the fact that management turned a blind eye to all of his misdeeds due to his high efficiency.
Starting your own company
The lack of further growth at Goldman Sachs influenced the decision to start his own business.
After leaving the firm with his colleague Jack Walt, they set up their own fund, Appaloosa, with a charter capital of $57 million.
At the time, Tepper's fund was delivering a 37 percent annual return, leading to a huge influx of assets.
After a year of operation, the company had attracted $300 million, and after another year of operation, it had more than $800 million under management.
David Tepper gained immense fame and wealth after buying up shares and debt obligations of companies such as Bank of America and Citigroup, whose shares were at their lowest point after the mortgage crisis and the collapse of Lehman Bros.
A year later, shares rose in price by more than 300 percent, and the company closed the year with a record return of 120 percent.
David Tepper's net worth is currently estimated at over $11.5 billion, with his foundation continuing to actively invest and Tepper himself actively involved in philanthropy.
