Michael Burry is a licensed physician, value investor and hedge fund manager who rose to prominence by predicting and making a fortune in the financial crisis that occurred in 2008. After this, his name got more recognition after his story got told in the 2015 film titled The Big Short. As of 2023, Michael Burry has a net worth of $300 million.
Early Life
Burry was born on June 19, 1971, in the California city of San Jose. Because of a type of cancer called retinoblastoma, he lost his left eye when he was two years old and has worn a prosthetic substitute ever since.
At the University of California, Los Angeles, he majored in economics and pre-med. He graduated with an M.D. from the School of Medicine at Vanderbilt University.
He began but did not complete his pathology residency at Stanford University Medical Center. Burry’s medical license is still active with the Medical Board of California, despite the fact that he never practiced.
Hedge Fund
Michael focused on his pastime, financial investment, every time he was off duty at night in his pathology residency. When he decided to quit his medical career, he started Scion Capital hedge fund in 2000.
His strategy is to diversify his portfolio by investing in 12 to 18 stocks. When the time arrives, he is not hesitant to sell equities with a 40% to 50% profit. Within a year, the fund had risen by little under 12%. The next year, with a profit margin of 16%, the results were even better.
The hedge fund manager’s biggest stint was forecasting the 2008 financial crisis triggered by the housing bubble. He and his firm made about $700 million from it. This story was turned into a book, The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine, and was later adapted into a movie.
Personal Investing
From 2000 to 2008, his firm’s overall gain was 489.34%. However, after the fund’s enormous success, Burry shut it down and pursued a career in personal investing.
Michael has established himself as one of America’s most successful investors in the following decade. He kept making high-return personal investments and expanded his wealth.
He restarted his hedge firm in 2013, this time under the name Scion Asset Management. The company filed reports as an SEC-approved exempt reporting adviser (ERA) operating in California. Today, he is still running the fund.
Net Worth
With Scion Asset Management, Michael Burry is investing in farmland, gold, and, more controversial, water. He has said that his reason for putting his money into water is because it is becoming an increasingly scarce asset.
As for the stocks he holds, Scion Asset Management’s most considerable investments are Facebook and Alphabet Inc. In 2021, Burry also decided to own put options for Tesla and the ARKK ETF but has since exited those trades. All of this accounts for his current net worth of $300 million.
Personal Life
Michael is married to a woman named Cassandra. Together, they have three children. One of the kids has Asperger syndrome, a condition that affects a person’s social abilities.