Kyle Bass is the founder of Hayman Capital. He is famous now for buying Greek Sovereign Credit Default swaps at $1,000 for $1 million of the price. He Supposedly made a 650x return for each swap which he bought. He was also early in the subprime game and shorted that successfully, as well.
Bass is a known bear. He owns physical gold and even has a sheltered stocked up and ready for doomsday.
Bass has been in the media recently for his bearish views on Japan. We have disagreed strongly as noted here.
Bass compared Japan’s method of financing its debt to the massive ponzi scheme by Bernie Madoff in a recent interview stating:
“You can make promises for a long time as long as you don`t have to live up to them.”
“Japan is in the crosshairs of the market… I`ve never seen more mispriced optionality in my entire life.”
He has purchased Credit default swaps and shorted Japanese Government bonds, according to statements and people familiar with the matter.
So far the trade has been going in the opposite direction. According to our source, Bass’ Macro Opportunities Master Fund is down 32% in April alone.
January performance was -8%, February 7% and March 2%, and year to date -29%.
Since inception in July, 2010 the fund is down 61%.
We were unable to confirm assets under management or percentages of each security in the fund.
The Japan trade has not played out yet, but Bass made the above comments only several days ago. He clearly thinks that eventually he will be proven correct.
