 Be they the battles of ancient civilizations or the 10-year performance of a health care stock, the details of the past have always fascinated David Tsoupros, CFA. It is this well-cultivated, extensive interest in all things historic that has shaped Tsoupros both professionally and personally, taking him to where he is today.
A senior analyst at the New York-based hedge fund Roaring Brook Capital, Tsoupros credits his success, in part, to his ability to take the past and all its related lessons into account. “To be successful in this job you have to have your hand in everything and know your industry,” Tsoupros says. “That means not just knowing what’s going on today but looking at prior examples. You know, there are a lot of times when I’m looking at a stock and saying, ‘Does this remind me of something that happened in the past?’ You can always compare things that are happening today to things that have happened to the market in the past.”
Absorbing and applying the lessons of yesterday isn’t something new for Tsoupros. Growing up, he found history appealing, satisfying both his intellectual curiosity and love for learning. Tsoupros says he found ancient civilizations to be particularly compelling and relevant. But it was contemporary U.S. history that ultimately spoke to him. Fittingly, Tsoupros graduated from the University of Virginia with a major in history, with his four years of study culminating in a thesis project written under the tutelage of Julian Bond, a renowned civil rights activist and former chairman of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).
Post-graduation, history became solely a hobby for Tsoupros, as he chose to apply his analytical skills to the world of finance. Being paid to think, Tsoupros says, was a very attractive prospect. “The thing that attracted me most was I felt like I would never really be bored because you can control what you’re doing,” he explains. “[The investment profession] is mostly thinking and writing what you know or what you learn.”
Thus, he accepted a position at a Merrill Lynch brokerage office in Manhattan where he had interned the summer before. Two years later, Tsoupros moved to the firm’s research department where he got his first taste of how analysts think and respond to market events. “It was there,” Tsoupros says, “that I figured out that if I wanted to stay and continue and move up in the research department that going the CFA Program route was the best option for me.”
Although studying for the CFA examinations came at a busy time in his life — each level passed coincided with the birth of a daughter — Tsoupros was able to see a light at the end of the tunnel. Now a father of three, Tsoupros says the CFA charter opened doors that were previously shut. “It definitely helped and moved me along that path, even before I had passed Level III and received my charter,” he says. Tsoupros also feels the charter offered credibility, showing employers that he had a strong understanding of the fundamentals of finance.
And if earning the CFA designation wasn’t enough, Tsoupros’ abilities were further affirmed by his subsequent accomplishments. This success is quantifiable — in 2007, Tsoupros was named to the Wall Street Journal’s annual “Best on the Street” survey for his research coverage of the real estate sector while at Merrill Lynch. But personally, Tsoupros measures his performance using a far less public metric; to him, success is best illustrated when one of his recommendations comes to fruition. To illustrate, he shared a particularly rewarding experience when a risky and unpopular buy recommendation on a healthcare REIT stock panned out — much to his critics’ disbelief.
“They were saying, ‘Look, this stock has been dead in the water for three years and here you’ve got a buy on it and, you know, your price target is $10 above where the stock is. What makes you think that you’re right?’” Tsoupros explained. “[I]t is kind of rewarding to see six months later that the stock has gone through that price target and that same person is e-mailing you, saying ‘Oh, man, I remember I e-mailed you in August and gave you grief. I’m sorry I did that. We ended up sticking with your recommendation, although I doubted it at the time, and it’s worked out. Thank you.’ That’s a pretty rewarding feeling, and it’s pretty concrete.”
When asked what he saw in the stock that others missed, Tsoupros chalks it up to doing his homework and paying attention to the details. The company was in the middle of a strategic transition, he explained, and the market wasn’t recognizing what the company could become. Having seen other companies rebound successfully from similar transitions over time, Tsoupros says he felt the company in question was well positioned for growth. “I’m not going to say that luck doesn’t ever play a part in things,” he adds. “But maybe I just happened to see something when other people didn’t.”
Today, Tsoupros continues to incorporate the market’s historical performance into his stock analysis, allowing him to pick up on nuances often overlooked by others. But now he’s on the buy side, covering healthcare equities at Roaring Brook Capital, a long-short investment partnership that manages nearly US$100 million in assets. Tsoupros is thrilled in his new role, noting that the sector’s many variables — from government oversight to Medicare reform — lend to an exciting, yet challenging, position.
Fortunately, if past performance serves as a reliable indicator of the future, it is safe to say that Tsoupros will be up to the challenge. |
