Wikipedia Draft:Gabe Plotkin

Gabriel Plotkin is an American hedge fund manager, investor and the Founder and Chief Investment Officer of Melvin Capital Management LP which he founded in 2014. He is a minority owner of the Charlotte Hornets since 2019. He previously served as a Portfolio Manager at SAC Capital Advisors.

Early Life and Education
Plotkin was raised in Portland Maine.

Career
After graduating from Northwestern University with a degree in Economics in 2001, Gabriel Plotkin joined hedge fund Citadel LLC and later Connecticut-based hedge fund North Sound Capital. Prior to starting Melvin Capital, Plotkin was a Portfolio Manager at SAC Capital where he managed a portfolio of mostly consumer stocks valued at about $1.3 billion.

During his time at SAC Capital, Plotkin was the recipient of illegal insider information according to federal prosecutors. Reuters identified Plotkin as the so called "Portfolio Manager B" in the Securities and Exchange Commission's civil complaint against Michael Steinberg, a fellow SAC PM who was arrested on charges he traded Dell's earnings based on insider information. Plotkin was allegedly forwarded several emails by Steinberg and others that contained insider information.

Plotkin founded Melvin Capital, after leaving SAC during the insider trading blowup, in late 2014, naming the fund after his late grandfather who was a small-business owner. He raised nearly $1 billion. CIO Gabe Plotkin described the fund to Bloomberg as “a very human-intensive place. We have a lot of analysts, we require a lot out of them”. He also said that the fund has an "intense focus" on the short side (i.e. short selling).

2021 losses
In early 2021 Melvin Capital lost over 30% due to numerous short bets that went awry, including GameStop. Users of the subreddit r/WallStreetBets made widespread bets that GameStop's stock would increase in value. In January, Ken Griffin's Citadel and Steve Cohen's Point72 invested $2.75 billion in Melvin in exchange for non-controlling revenue shares of the fund. CNBC's Andrew Ross Sorkin reported that fund manager Gabriel Plotkin advised Melvin Capital had closed (i.e. covered) its short position in GameStop on January 26 in the afternoon, although CNBC could not confirm the amount that Melvin Capital lost. Melvin Capital also contended that rumors of the fund intending to file for bankruptcy are false. On January 27 Bloomberg News reported that losses had continued past the 30% reported on January 24 by the WSJ although their sources would not give a specific number as to not upset CIO Gabe Plotkin. The fund had also repositioned its portfolio according to the source.

The short position adopted by Melvin Capital and others resulted in more than 139% percent of existing shares of GME being shorted, making GameStop stock the most shorted equity in the world.

Through the end of January 2021, the fund was down 53%, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Plotkin testified before the House Financial Services Committee about Melvin Capital's involved in the Gamestop short squeeze.

Compensation
According to Forbes, Plotkin earned about $300 million in compensation in 2017, making him the 20th highest paid hedge fund manager that year. Plotkin purchased a minority interest in the Charlotte Hornets in 2019 from Michael Jordan. According to Bloomberg, during 2020 Plotkin earned over $800 million in compensation. However, during January 2021, he reportedly lost $460 million due to his funds collapsing.

Personal Life
Plotkin married Yaara Bank in 2006 and has 4 children. Plotkin rarely gives media interviews; as of January 2021, Plotkin's only public media appearance has been on the podcast All That Glitters.

In December 2020 Plotkin purchased 2 adjacent houses in Florida for $44 million.

Plotkin purchased a minority interest in the Charlotte Hornets in 2019 from Michael Jordan.

Praise
In 2021 during an interview on CNBC Citadel CEO Ken Griffin said "I think Gabe Plotkin is one of the finest investors of his generation".