2017 Trading World Champion Rankings

Chase Coleman's Tiger Global Management returned approximately 34% in 2017, making it one of the best-performing large hedge funds in the world for the year. The result was driven primarily by concentrated positions in technology companies, both in the US and China, that caught the full force of the year's dominant theme: the tech mega-cap rally. Coleman was early and aggressive on names including Alibaba and JD.com — Chinese internet platforms that surged as China's digital economy expanded — along with major US tech positions that rode the FAANG wave.

2017 was the kind of year that rewarded Coleman's approach perfectly. With the S&P 500 up 19.4% and tech stocks leading by a wide margin, a concentrated growth-equity fund with the right names was going to post huge numbers. But even among tech-focused managers, Coleman stood out. Tiger Global's ~34% return was meaningfully ahead of most peers, reflecting not just sector selection but individual stock picking and position sizing. The fund's Chinese internet exposure, which many US-based managers were underweight, was a key differentiator.

Coleman is one of the original "Tiger Cubs" — fund managers who trained under Julian Robertson at Tiger Management before launching their own firms. He founded Tiger Global in 2001 at age 25, with Robertson as an early backer, and built it into one of the most influential technology investors in the world. By 2017, the firm managed roughly $22 billion across public equities and venture capital, making it both a major hedge fund and one of the largest technology venture investors globally.

Coleman's approach combines deep fundamental analysis of technology businesses with a willingness to take concentrated positions when conviction is high. Unlike diversified multi-strategy funds that spread risk across hundreds of positions, Tiger Global typically runs a relatively concentrated portfolio of 30 to 50 names, with the top ten positions representing a significant share of total capital. When he's right about the direction of technology — as he was in 2017 — that concentration produces outsized returns. In a year defined by tech dominance and low volatility, no one rode that wave with more scale and conviction than Chase Coleman. Full article »

Chris Hohn's TCI Fund Management returned 29% net of all fees in 2017, continuing a streak of strong performance from one of the most concentrated and conviction-driven hedge fund managers in the world. TCI runs an extremely focused portfolio — typically fewer than 15 positions — built around deep fundamental research on infrastructure-like businesses with durable competitive advantages. In 2017, the fund's holdings in railroads, exchanges, and technology infrastructure companies benefited from the broad equity rally while the concentrated approach amplified returns beyond what a diversified fund could achieve.

Hohn founded TCI in 2003 with backing from the Children's Investment Fund Foundation, the charity he established as part of the fund's unique structure. TCI donates a portion of profits to the foundation, making Hohn one of the largest philanthropic hedge fund managers in history. The 29% return in 2017 was strong but not an outlier for TCI, which has generated annualized returns of roughly 18% since inception despite a devastating 43% drawdown in 2008. Hohn's activist approach — taking large stakes and pushing for operational improvements or capital returns — creates a differentiated return profile that doesn't simply track the market, even in years where the market itself does well.

Philippe Laffont's Coatue Management returned 29.3% in 2017, driven by concentrated positions in technology companies that led the year's rally. Laffont, another Tiger Cub who trained under Julian Robertson, has built Coatue into one of the premier technology-focused hedge funds, managing approximately $7 billion by the end of 2017. The fund's positions in Facebook, Shopify, and other high-growth technology names captured the year's dominant theme: investors paying premium valuations for companies with strong revenue growth and dominant market positions.

Coatue's approach combines deep technology sector expertise with a long-short equity framework, though in a year like 2017, the long book drove the vast majority of returns. Laffont ranks third behind Hohn despite a marginally higher percentage return because TCI's concentrated activist approach and broader market-cap coverage demonstrate a different kind of edge than riding a sector tailwind. That said, 29.3% on billions of dollars in a single-sector strategy is an exceptional result, and Laffont's consistent presence among the top tech-focused managers year after year reflects genuine skill rather than just sector beta.

Stefano Serafini won the 2017 World Trading Championships futures division with an audited return of 217.2%, the highest verified competition result of the year. The World Trading Championship, administered by Robbins Trading Company since 1984, requires participants to trade real money in fully audited brokerage accounts, making it the gold standard for verifiable individual trading performance. Serafini, an Italian trader based in Switzerland, competed for the full twelve-month period against a global field and maintained his lead throughout most of the year.

Serafini's approach is algorithmic. He runs approximately 80 different trading systems across multiple futures markets, exploiting intraday session biases with both trend-following and mean-reversion models. His background includes a degree in economics from the University of Trento and a master's in finance, followed by a career that spanned banking and family business before he committed full-time to systematic trading. The 217% result earned him a place alongside other notable World Trading Championship champions like Andrea Unger, the four-time winner who helped popularize algorithmic approaches to the competition. Serafini's win validated the systematic approach in a year where most of the returns in the broader market were driven by directional equity exposure.

David Tepper's Appaloosa Management had a strong 2017, benefiting from the broad equity rally and Tepper's characteristically aggressive positioning in risk assets. Tepper, who founded Appaloosa in 1993 with Jack Walton, has built one of the most impressive long-term track records in the hedge fund industry, with annualized returns exceeding 25% since inception. In 2017, with the S&P 500 up 19.4% and credit markets benign, Tepper's event-driven and macro approach found fertile ground in a market that rewarded being long equities and credit.

Tepper is known for making large, high-conviction bets during periods of market stress — his legendary call to buy banks and distressed debt in early 2009 generated $7 billion in a single year. But he is equally effective in bull markets, where his willingness to stay fully invested and lean into risk positions generates returns that many more cautious managers leave on the table. By the end of 2017, Appaloosa managed approximately $16.5 billion, and Tepper's personal net worth placed him among the wealthiest hedge fund managers in the world. His inclusion at #5 reflects both the strong year and the broader career that has made him one of the most respected traders of his generation.