Chris Hohn

Sir Christopher Hohn^[3] KCMG (born 1967) is an English hedge fund manager and philanthropist. In 2003 Hohn established The Children's Investment Fund Management (TCI) a prominent value-based investment fund manager noted for long-term, owner orientated engagement with publicly listed companies. Profits generated by the fund were proportionatly allocated to The Children's Investment Fund Foundation a registered charity in England and Wales that focuses on improving the lives of children living in poverty in developing countries.^[4] In the five years from 2006 until 2011, Hohn gave away almost £1 billion.^[4] He is known as an activist investor.

Early life

Hohn was born in 1967 in Addlestone, Surrey.^[5] His father Paul^[6] was a Jamaican-born car mechanic of European descent who moved to Britain in 1960, and his mother was a legal secretary from East Sussex.^[7] After gaining 13 O Levels, he attended the University of Southampton which he graduated from in 1988 with a first-class honours in accounting and business economics.^[5] Whilst at Southampton, a tutor advised him to apply for Harvard Business School, where he completed the Master of Business Administration course.^[7] He graduated in 1993 as a Baker Scholar, meaning he was among the top 5 per cent of all graduates.^[7]

Career

After graduating, Hohn worked for the private equity group Apax Partners.^[5] In 1996 he went to work for Perry Capital, a hedge fund on Wall Street.^[5] In 1998 he was made head of Perry's London operations.^[5] In his time with Perry, he earned an estimated £75m.

In 2003, Hohn set up his own hedge fund, The Children's Investment Fund. TCI donated regularly to a connected charitable fund, The Children's Investment Fund Foundation, run by his wife. The original formula involved transfers of 0.5 percent of the fund's assets each year, with a further 0.5 per cent of assets for every year during which the fund achieved returns of more than 11 per cent. It is reported that Hohn established the formulaic charitable link in order to motivate himself.^[5] More recently, in March 2013, TCI announced that it would stop donating to the foundation because it is "large enough." ^[8]

In February 2014, Forbes listed Chris Hohn as one of the 25 Highest-Earning hedge fund managers in 2013. His 2013 total earnings of $380 millions ranks him the 18th among the 25 top earning hedge fund managers.^[9]

Hohn was appointed Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George (KCMG) in the 2014 Birthday Honours for services to philanthropy and international development.^[10]

Personal life

He married Jamie Cooper, a fellow Harvard graduate student from Chicago, whom he had met at a party during his studies.^[11] Upon marriage, they took each other's surnames to become Cooper-Hohn, although he is still widely known as Hohn. The couple went on to have four children, including triplets.^[12]

In 2013 it was reported that Hohn had begun divorce proceedings with his wife.^[13] In November 2014, he was set to pay his American-born ex-wife $500m^[14] in what is thought to be the biggest divorce settlement ever awarded by an English court.^[15] In December 2014, he was ordered to pay his ex-wife £337M. ^[16]

References