Victor Niederhoffer - 1997 Losses

1997 Losses

In 1997, Niederhoffer Investments was not finding many opportunities for investments and, having returned much of its funds to customers such as George Soros, began investing the remaining 100 million dollars in areas where Niederhoffer later admitted that he did not have much expertise. Niederhoffer decided to buy Thai bank stocks, which had fallen heavily in the Asian financial crisis, his bet being that the Thai government would not allow these companies to go out of business. On October 27, 1997, losses resulting from this investment, combined with a 554 point (7.2%) single day decline in the Dow Jones Industrial Average (the second largest point decline to date in index history), forced Niederhoffer Investments to close its doors. In a lawsuit that Niederhoffer later filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois against the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, where he traded options, he alleged that floor traders colluded to drive the market down that day to force him out of his positions. Traders at the time said Refco may have been responsible for as much as $35 million of Niederhoffer's losses.