All Things Coatue Management
In this article, we explore Philippe Laffont’s career: how he founded Coatue Management, how you can get a job there, what the firm culture is like, and much more.
Philippe Laffont
Philippe Laffont is a part of the founders of the first generation of "Tiger Cub" hedge funds, sharing the limelight with shops such as Blue Ridge (John Griffin), Lone Pine (Stephen Mandel), Maverick (Lee Ainslie), Viking Global (Andreas Halvorsen), and Tiger Global (Chase Coleman).
Before entering finance, Philippe's passion was in computers and technology. This fascination led him to apply to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he was accepted in 1985. Despite obtaining an MS in Computer Science from MIT, his initial attempts to join the West Coast tech scene were met with rejections from three different departments of Apple Computer, which compelled him to take a position at McKinsey's Madrid office.
While working in Spain, Philippe met his future wife Ana Isabel Diez de Rivera, who hailed from an influential Spanish family.
Despite Philippe's desire to return to the United States, Ana wished to remain in Spain. The compromise they reached led Philippe to spend a year working for Ana's family business, an experience that saw him relegated to a basement office with minimal responsibilities.
During this time, Philippe turned to stock listings in the Herald Tribune to fill his idle hours, sparking his interest in stock investing. His early investments included Microsoft, Intel, and Dell. Philippe's brother, Thomas, residing in California, became a confidant with whom he shared investment ideas.
Philippe did well in his investments. However, even today, Philippe recognizes the role of luck in his early successes during favorable market conditions.
A year later, Philippe and Ana moved to America, where he faced the challenge of breaking into the investment management industry with a computer science background and limited connections. Philippe had to work for a mutual fund unpaid, eventually meeting someone at a conference who introduced him to Tiger Management.
His MIT resume landed him in Tiger's IT department, where the firm had no IT openings. So he was initially rejected.
Through a friend of a friend, Philippe got an introduction to Julian Robertson, but Philippe was given only two minutes. Philippe got right to the point and told Julian he wanted to pick tech stocks at Tiger Management. Julian connected Philippe with his tech analysts. Interviews later, he got the job.
Philippe spent the next three-and-a-half years honing his skills at Tiger Management. He has a natural aptitude for numbers and the ability to identify issues in complex spreadsheets with remarkable precision. But what’s most valuable is his ability to translate details into big investment decisions, a key skill as a portfolio manager whose responsibility lies in monetizing ideas with appropriate sizing.
More to come:
Founding Coatue
Products and Fee Structure
Org Structure
Research Process
How to get a job there
Firm culture