DAN LOEB: Three Ways Yoga Makes Me A Better Investor
Screenshot from AEI
Hedge fund manager Daniel Loeb, who runs $14 billion Third Point LLC, was on a panel yesterday with His Holiness the Dalai Lama at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C.Loeb explained to His Holiness how financial markets make the world a better place.
He also spoke extensively about his experience studying yoga and how that helps him be a better investor.
Loeb started Third Point LLC in June of 1995 with $3 million under management. He began practicing Ashtanga yoga just a few months before that.
Five months later after starting Third Point, Loeb's yoga instructor, Eddie Stern, convinced him to go to India to study yoga with Ashtanga yoga master, Pattabhi Jois. He said that was an "unusual decision." A friend/competitor of Loeb called him up and told him it wasn't a good idea, "Don't do that. That's a huge mistake. Everyone's going to think you're a flake for leaving your business, going to India and studying yoga for a month." Back then, Loeb explained, there wasn't internet access readily available or cell phone service, so the other fund manager's concerns weren't completely unwarranted. Loeb went to India anyway. He said that month-long experience was what launched him into a "life long passion for spirituality, for contemplation, meditation." "Contemplation, meditation-It's not for monks and hermits," Loeb said, adding, "I think they can really improve all of our lives and they can really improve us as business people as well." Basically, Loeb believes that contemplation makes people better decision-makers. Through the practice of yoga, Loeb said he's received three lessons that are crucial for being a better investor and decision-maker. He applies them to his work at Third Point, and we've paraphrased them below:- Yoga quiets the fluctuations in the mind. Basically, it puts the mind at ease.
- Yoga helps put ourselves into difficult positions and to be able to create a sense equanimity in those difficult situations so that you can persevere and emerge from those situations making good choices.
- Yoga teaches us that when we make choices they come not just from what's going to create a favorable outcome. Make sure we make decisions that do no harm and are consistent with our moral frame work.