James Tomilson "Tom" Hill III (born May 24, 1948)[1][2] is an American billionaire hedge fund manager, the former president and CEO of Blackstone Alternative Asset Management (BAAM), Blackstone Group's hedge funds business.[3][4][5][6][7]

J. Tomilson Hill
Born
James Tomilson Hill III

May 24, 1948
EducationThe Buckley School
Milton Academy
Alma materHarvard College
Harvard Business School
Occupationhedge fund manager
SpouseJanine W. Hill
Children2

Early life and education edit

Hill was born in New York and attended The Buckley School and Milton Academy, where he was a varsity wrestler. Hill received his B.A., cum laude, from Harvard College, where he wrote for The Harvard Lampoon and studied history, literature, and Japanese studies. He received his M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.

Career edit

Hill started his career at First Boston in 1973, where he was one of the founding principals of its mergers and acquisitions department, and then moved to Smith Barney, where he served as the head of its mergers and acquisitions department. In 1982, he joined Lehman Brothers as a partner in its M&A department and later became head of M&A, head of Investment Banking and co-CEO. Filmmaker Oliver Stone used J. Tomilson Hill as one of several inspirations for the character Gordon Gekko, portrayed by Michael Douglas in the 1987 movie, Wall Street.[8][9]

While at Lehman, Hill participated in the multi-sided takeover battle for control of RJR Nabisco in 1988, the largest leveraged buyout in history up to that time, and a seminal event in the history of private equity. Barbarians at the Gate, the best-selling book chronicling that saga, described Hill as “an oiled-back Gordon Gekko haircut atop 5 feet, 10 inches of icy Protestant reserve.”[10][11]

In 1993 Hill joined Blackstone, where he served as co-head of the corporate mergers and acquisitions advisory group. In 2007, he became vice chairman of the firm. Since 2000, he has served as president and chief executive of Blackstone's hedge fund business, Blackstone Alternative Asset Management (BAAM), and has grown that business's assets under management from $1.3 billion in 2000 to $56 billion as of December 31, 2013.

BAAM is currently the world's largest discretionary allocator to hedge funds, with investors including mostly corporate and public pension funds, sovereign wealth funds and central banks. The business's growth from 2007 to 2013, at a time when the industry generally contracted substantially, was featured in a June 2013 Harvard Business Review case study. Hill has appeared at the 2014 Credit Suisse Financial Services Forum, the 2011 Milken Institute Global Conference, and the 2012 Bloomberg Hedge Fund Summit, among others. In 2014, Hill was inducted into Institutional Investor's Alpha's "Hedge Fund Hall of Fame".[12]

In the spring of 2021, it was announce that Hill would become chairman of private investments at Two Sigma, a 'quant' hedge fund with $58 billion in assets under management.[13]

Philanthropy edit

Hill is the chairman of Lincoln Center Theater and has served as chairman of the Smithsonian's Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. He serves on the board of directors of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Telluride Foundation, the Advantage Testing Foundation, and Our Lady Queen of Angels School, a Catholic school in East Harlem that is part of the Partnership for Inner-City Education school network.

In 2014, the Frick Collection presented "Renaissance and Baroque Bronzes from the Hill Collection", a group of thirty-three statuettes from Hill's personal collection that date from the mid-fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries. In 2017, Hill opened the Hill Art Foundation a gallery on West 24th Street in Chelsea to exhibit his private collection to the public in 2019.[14][15]

Personal life edit

Hill lives in Manhattan with his wife, Saint Louis native Janine W. Hill, who serves as director of fellowship affairs and studies strategic planning at the Council on Foreign Relations.[16] They have two daughters: Margot Langdon Hill Kirby[17] and Astrid Hill Lloyd.

In 2004, Hill sold Mark Rothko's No. 6 (Yellow, White, Blue Over Yellow on Gray) (1954) for $17.3 million at Sotheby's, a record for the artist.[18]

Further reading edit

References edit

  1. ^ "LittleSis: J Tomilson Hill". littlesis.org. Archived from the original on 2023-03-30. Retrieved 2023-05-14.
  2. ^ "J. Tomilson Hill". Forbes. Archived from the original on 2022-10-10. Retrieved 2023-05-14.
  3. ^ "25 Highest-paid men - J. Tomilson Hill III (22) - FORTUNE". Archived from the original on 2014-04-15. Retrieved 2023-05-14.
  4. ^ "J. Tomilson Hill - Council on Foreign Relations". Archived from the original on 2011-01-28. Retrieved 2010-06-25.
  5. ^ "Sheikha Mozah Bint Nasser Al-Missned". Archived from the original on April 25, 2009.
  6. ^ "Blackstone biography". blackstone.com. Archived from the original on 28 July 2010. Retrieved 26 August 2018.
  7. ^ "Advantage Testing Foundation Board of Trustees". advantagetesting.com. Archived from the original on 16 January 2013. Retrieved 26 August 2018.
  8. ^ "Blackstone's J. Tomilson Hill". 30 March 2010. Archived from the original on 2022-12-06. Retrieved 2023-05-14.
  9. ^ "The Inspiration for Gordon Gekko is Now a Billionaire". Business Insider. Archived from the original on 2021-09-19. Retrieved 2023-05-14.
  10. ^ "A Second Act for a Top Wall Street Strategist". 2 December 2013. Archived from the original on 4 February 2018. Retrieved 5 March 2017.
  11. ^ Burroughs, Bryan & Helyar, John (October 13, 2009) [1st pub. 1989] Barbarians at the Gate. ISBN 0099469154
  12. ^ "Institutional Investor's Alpha Hedge Fund Hall of Fame Inducts Four New Members". marketwired.com. Archived from the original on 17 August 2016. Retrieved 4 Feb 2017.
  13. ^ "Two Sigma Names Tom Hill to Oversee Private Investment Business". Bloomberg.com. 18 March 2021. Archived from the original on 2021-07-20. Retrieved 2023-05-14.
  14. ^ "A Billionaire Is Opening a Private Art Museum in Manhattan" Archived 2016-11-15 at the Wayback Machine by Robin Pogrebin, The New York Times, July 28, 2016
  15. ^ Wool, Christopher (6 March 2019). "Christopher Wool's paintings and photographs at the new Hill Art Foundation". New York Times. Archived from the original on 6 March 2019. Retrieved 7 March 2019.
  16. ^ Council on Foreign Relations: "Janine Hill" Archived 2014-11-01 at the Wayback Machine retrieved October 23, 2014
  17. ^ "Margot Hill, Colin Kirby" Archived 2017-11-09 at the Wayback Machine, The New York Times, August 18, 2013
  18. ^ Carol Vogel (November 10, 2004), Contemporary Art Shows Its Strength in a $93 Million Sale Archived 2021-02-23 at the Wayback Machine New York Times.

External links edit