Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square shines in 2023, beating Ken Griffin’s Citadel

Bill Ackman, the popular hedge fund manager, has another strong performance in 2023 as he outperformed the likes of Ken Griffin, Carl Icahn, and Izzy Englander. Data compiled in its website shows that the hedge fund’s returns in 2023 stood at 26.7%, higher than S&P 500’s total return of 24.23%.

Bill Ackman’s performance was one of the highest in the industry. Ken Griffin, one of the biggest money printers, returned 15.3% in his flagship Citadel Wellington fund. Citadel Tactical Trading, Citadel Equities, and Citadel Fixed Income returned 14.8%, 11.6%, and 11.6%, respectively. 

Meanwhile, Ackman also trounced Izzy Englander’s $61 billion Millenium Capital, which returned 10%. Also, he also outperformed D.E Shaw’s Composite and D.E Shaw Oculus. Discovery Capital, which manages over $2.5 billion was one of the top-performing hedge funds of 2023 as it returned over 40%. The fund owns companies like Google, Nvidia, and Vertiv.

Bill Ackman’s returns rose as most of his companies jumped. As I wrote here, some of his best-performing companies were Chipotle Mexican Grill, Google, and Hilton Worldwide. Chipotle benefited from the reopening, restaurant openings, and online orders. Google, on the other hand, jumped because of its investments in artificial intelligence.

Most importantly, Ackman continued to make accurate macro bets. He made $200 million within a few months after going short US Treasuries. These assets started to rebound shortly after he exited his trade.

Ackman’s performance was also stronger than that of Carl Icahn, the billionaire activist investor. Icahn Enterprises (IEP) stock price crashed by over 63% after an activist investor highlighted the key challenges in its business. As a result, the company was forced to slash its dividend to preserve cash.

Some other hedge funds had a difficult performance in 2023. For example, Jim Chanos of Kynikos Associates shuttered his firm after making substantial losses. In Europe, Chrispin Odey shut down his fund after sexual allegations. Further, Blackstone’s multi-strategy fund shut after assets plunged by 90%.

Bill Ackman also scored a major win after Claudine Gay, the head of Harvard University stepped down this week. Ackman was one of the most vocal financiers in calling for her and the board to step down.

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