How Did Vivek Ramaswamy Make $7M In His First 7 Years in PE?

https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnhyatt/2023/08/21…

"After graduating, Ramaswamy joined the hedge fund QVT, where he specialized in pharmaceutical investments. He earned $7 million in the first seven years of his career and made partner by 28."

Dude, I'm 28 and I'm still jerking off with my thumb in my ass. How does partner + $7M happen by 28? Is it just shitty reporting and he lied in his book and Forbes didn't bother to verify? Or legit?

Side Note - Guy is an absolute douche on stage. 

10 Comments
 

Ah, that's where my disconnect was. I thought it was PE, think I read it as EQT for some reason at first. 

I wish I knew more about pharma. You hear about guys like Shkreli & RammaSwamma who were able to find real gold in underappreciated or orphan drugs and line up financing to buy them up, when they were only 20-something. Feel like there aren't a ton of industries where you can hit it that big just by acquiring an existing asset for so little up-front capital. 

 
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I think QVT hires a lot of investment professionals with legal backgrounds. Interestingly, if you go to their careers site and the "Investment Professionals" section, they actually specify that they prefer it. 

Might have something to do with their investment strategy if they're structure heavy and/or doing a bunch of formation transactions or esoteric types of deals that entail as much legal/structuring work as traditional financial analysis. Stuff like distressed debt/bankruptcy or investing equity directly into a new entity to purchase a pharma asset into and then JV with a bigger pharma firm blah blah blah.  

I feel like we all know someone like him. Seems like one of those Indian guys that still has a caste system mentality and has clearly spent years white-washing himself to appear more "American". Insecure, like he's trying to get White Americas respect in all the wrong ways. 

 

Right? No disrespect to him career wise and some of it’s part of the typical campaign song and dance, but it feels like he’s an Indian guy that wishes he was white. And this is coming from someone that’s also Indian American. I compare it to the old wealth / new wealth sides of America, and he’s the new guy trying to break into the same country club loving groups that just see him as some Indian guy that fell into “new” money. No doubt he’s smart and polished but it’s hard to believe anything he says is even a little genuine.

 

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