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Scott Bessent (born 1962) is an American investor, philanthropist, and educator. [1] [2] [3] [4] He is the founder of Key Square Group, a global macro investment firm. [1] [5] [6] [7] [8]
Bessent was born in Conway, South Carolina. [9] [10] He attended Yale College, graduating in 1984. [9] [11] [12] While at Yale, Bessent wrote for The Yale Daily News, was President of Wolf's Head Society and Treasurer for the class of 1984. [13]
Bessent was previously the Chief Investment Officer of Soros Fund Management, the $30 billion family office of billionaire George Soros. [9] [14] [15] [16] From 2006 to 2011, Bessent was an Adjunct Professor of economic history at Yale, where he taught three courses. [9] [10] [17] [2] [12] The Daily Beast included his 2010 class in its listing of “Hottest College Courses.” [18]
Bessent first joined Soros Fund Management (SFM) in 1991 and was a partner there throughout the 1990s. [9] [2] At the age of 29, he was asked to head SFM's London office. [9] [14] [19] [20]
According to Sebastian Mallaby's history of hedge funds, More Money Than God, Bessent's analytics played a key role in helping George Soros and Stan Druckenmiller construct SFM's wager against the British pound, which netted the firm a profit of $1 billion. [10] [21] [5] [22] [23]
In addition to heading the London office, Bessent served as SFM's head of global research and co-head of external manager selection.2,3,5,16 He also directly managed $1.5 billion of the firm's capital. [9] [24]
After resigning from SFM in 2000, Bessent founded a $1 billion hedge fund, which he converted to a family office in 2005. [9] [19] He was also a senior investment advisor at fund-of-funds Protégé Partners. [10] [2]
Bessent was in the process of starting a new fund in the summer of 2011 when George Soros asked him to return to SFM as CIO. [14] [6]
Bessent served as the Chief Investment Officer of Soros Fund Management from 2011 to 2015. [25] Under Bessent's leadership, the firm made a profit of $10 billion. [25] [26]
In August 2015, it was announced that Bessent would be leaving Soros Fund Management to start his new firm, Key Square Group, with $2 billion of George Soros's money. [25] [15] [16]
Bessent founded Key Square Group with Michael Germino, who had been the Global Head of Capital Markets at SFM. [26] A number of the pair's former colleagues from SFM followed them to Key Square. [26] [7]
Key Square received a $2 billion anchor investment from George Soros. [25] [15] [16] By the end of its first quarter of operation, Key Square was managing $4.5 billion. [8]
At the end of 2017, Key Square's assets were $5.1 billion. [25] [1] Bloomberg in May 2018 reported that Key Square had mostly outperformed rival macro managers and continued to generate significant investor interest. [25] As part of a pre-arranged deal, the firm gradually returned the Soros capital as it took in other assets. [25] Its investors include Australia's sovereign wealth fund. [1]
Bessent has been active at his alma mater, Yale University, where he sits on the University Council. [13] He and his sister donated the Bessent Library to Yale in honor of their father, H. Gaston Bessent, Jr. [27] Bessent has also endowed three scholarships at Yale, including one for students who are first-generation college matriculants, one for students from South Carolina, and one for students from the Bronx. [27]
Bessent previously served on the board of God's Love We Deliver, an organization founded to deliver meals for homebound people with AIDS. [13] [28] He is a supporter of The Harlem Children's Zone, where he has chaired their annual dinner and mentors recent graduates. [29]
Bessent currently serves on the board of trustees of Rockefeller University, where he chairs the Investment Committee and is a member of the Executive Committee. [30] He is vice-chair of Classical American Homes Preservation Trust, and a former board member of the Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina. [30] [31] Bessent is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. [13] [30]
Bessent resides in Charleston, South Carolina. [32]
Bessent is a supporter of Donald Trump and was a co-chair at a Republican fundraiser for the former President in Palm Beach, Florida. [33]
Bessent is openly gay and is married to Scott Freeman with two children. [34] [35] [36]
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{{cite news}}: |first= has generic name (help)Steven Drobny, "The Stock Operator: Scott Bessent," Inside the House of Money
Sebastian Mallaby, More Money Than God: Hedge Funds and the Making of a New Elite