$364m hedge fund manager's spiritual awakening: "The most important thing is consciousness and love"

59-year-old Sir Christopher Anthony Hohn is not your average hedge fund manager. Some things about him are standard - Hohn is a billionaire, who earns a lot of money ($346m in 2023 and $690m in 2022) through his hedge fund TCI Fund Management. But he also gives a lot away. Hohn's charitable foundation has $6bn in assets, tackling everything from child protection and health to climate change.

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Speaking on the Money Maze Podcast last week, Hohn sounded more like John Lennon than an apex predator of capitalism. "Actually there's a something within all of us, who call it consciousness," Hohn told his interviewer. "Some people call it the soul.... What matters, is consciousness and love." 

Hohn, who is the son of a mechanic and a legal secretary and who reportedly lives more of a "Swatch" than a Rolex lifestyle despite having a net worth of $11bn, has expounded upon his moment of revelation before. Somewhere between graduating in economics from the UK's University of Southampton, studying an MBA at Harvard Business School and working for private equity firm Apax Partners followed by hedge fund Perry Capital, Hohn visited the Philippines and saw "people in poverty living on a garbage heap." When he was subsequently paid a $10m bonus, he gave it away to charity. "I actually don't own anything. I'm just a custodian," he says. "It's money that isn't mine. It's to be given away in service to humanity." 

Hohn isn't alone in pursuing things beyond materiality. This time last year, Citadel CEO Ken Griffin encouraged Cambridge University students to engage with the sublime and declared that, “When a door opens and lets you explore a different side of yourself, go through it.”   

Citadel has $71bn in assets under management (AUM); TCI Fund Management has around $70bn. The two funds pursue very different strategies: while Citadel is a multistrategy hedge fund that invests across multiple strategies with the aim of generating uncorrelated returns, TCI is a fundamental investor and invests in "strong businesses with sustainable competitive advantages." In July, the Financial Times reported that TCI was up 21% for the year. 

Speaking on last week's podcast, Hohn explained that he likes to invest in "hard assets and infrastructure" and said he has never, for example, invested in a manufacturer of handbags. TCI looks for companies in industries where there are big barriers to entry, he added. Aircraft engine manufacturers are one of his favourites: aircraft engine construction is a complex industry with an installed base of engines that need to be constantly updated. "In the short term, the market is a voting machine," said Hohn, quoting economist Benjamin Graham. "In the long term, it's a weighing machine." 

There are some industries that Hohn really doesn't like. They include media, asset management and banking. The danger with banks is that they can end up run by someone "without a lot intelligence," said Hohn. This can then be "toxic." Banks are also complicated. Hohn says he sat down with Brady Dougan, the former CEO of Credit Suisse, before the 2008 financial crisis and that Dougan admirably confessed to him that he didn't understand the bank's balance sheet.

If you want to pursue nirvana in the environs of Hohn, then good luck with it. Speaking on another podcast with Norges Investment Management earlier this year, Hohn said he only employs seven or eight portfolio managers, plus a larger back office. He wants to keep things personal, he said: "It's really important how we treat people, how everyone treats each other."

If you want to work for Hohn, you'll need to complete "one or two" case studies, but you'll also need to be the right sort of person. Humility is important. So is motivation beyond mere money. "Whether you go the easy way or the hard way through suffering, you eventually come to learn that the spiritual world is not just real, but it's the whole thing," Hohn said. 

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