The Fund

Ray Dalio, Bridgewater Associates, and the Unraveling of a Wall Street Legend

By: Rob Copeland

Narrated by: Rob Copeland, Will Damron

Length: 12 hrs and 54 mins

Publisher's summary

This program features an author's note and epilogue read by the author.

The unauthorized, unvarnished story of famed Wall Street hedge-fund manager Ray Dalio.

Ray Dalio does not want you to listen to this audiobook.

Late last year, when the billionaire founder of Bridgewater Associates, the largest hedge fund on the planet, announced that he was stepping down from the company he started out of his apartment nearly 50 years ago, the news made headlines around the world. Dalio cultivated an aura of international admiration and fame thanks to his company’s eye-popping success, coupled with a mystique he encouraged with frequent media appearances, celebrity hobnobbing, and his bestselling book, Principles. In The Fund, award-winning New York Times journalist Rob Copeland punctures this carefully constructed narrative of the benevolent business titan, exposing his much-promoted “principles” as one of the great feats of hubris in modern memory—in practice, they encouraged a toxic culture of paranoia and backstabbing.

The Fund is a thrilling, stranger-than-fiction journey into a rarefied world of wealth and power. It offers an unflinching look at the pain so often caused by the “radical transparency” Dalio has described as a core tenet of his recipe for business success and a meaningful life. Drawing on hundreds of interviews with those inside and around the firm, Copeland takes listeners into the room as former FBI director Jim Comey kisses Dalio's ring, recent Pennsylvania Senate candidate David McCormick drinks the Kool-Aid, and a rotating cast of memorable characters grapple with their personal psychological and moral limits—all under the watchful eye of their charismatic leader.

This is a cautionary tale for anyone convinced that the ability to make lots of money has anything at all to do with unlocking the principles of human nature.

A Macmillan Audio production from St. Martin’s Press.

©2023 Rob Copeland (P)2023 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

“At last, the era of the billionaire philosopher-king has a defining book. The Fund is a taut, nonfiction thriller."—Bryan Burrough, author of Barbarians at the Gate

“A classic American story about the most famous man on Wall Street—or the person he seems to be. The Fund manages to both shock and entertain at the same time.”—Philipp Meyer, bestselling author of American Rust and The Son

"The most explosive, mind-blowing business book I've ever read—and the most fun, too."—Bradley Hope, co-author of the New York Times bestseller Billion Dollar Whale and Pulitzer Prize finalist

Best finance book I've read in years

Tremendous! Easily the most entertaining/funny finance book I've ever read. Dalio is probably the best example of failing upward in the history of business.
Get it now!

Fastinating - Ray IS so much smarter and principled than the rest of us.

Appreciate the look into how hypocritical a wealthy & powerful leader believes he is above the law and smarter than every one else. A fastinating example of how so many of our politicians , the wealthy and the powerful manipulate others into doing their bidding. Following Ray Dalio over the years I somehow sensed a hypocrisy and his false humility but I never imagined someone with such opportunity and resources could be such a selfish monster. He's got more money than he can ever spend but it can't buy him what he really wants, which is a good legacy!

Really well written and gripping.

This is an amazing untold story. Most people only know The Principles, which is a white-washed version of what Bridgewater stands for.

that Daliot is a psycho

the content was good but it was hard to listen to because Daliot is psycho.

absolutely enlightening

It's like bad blood but without the collapse, so if you enjoyed anything like that, then you will enjoy this.

A bit Lowbrow at times, but still enlightening

Dalio himself called this a “Tabloid book”, and in some sense undortunately I agree, the writing is more low-brow than I would prefer; but I still think its important information for the public to be aware of.

Fascinating and illuminating!

This was a very well written book, and the narration was superb. The story was fascinating and illuminating. 

Utterly fascinating story of excess and narcissism

Whether or not you know Ray Dalio or are interested in finance, this book is a rare and eye opening look at a cult of personality. Despite Bridgewater's culture of secrecy, the culture of pervasive surveillance inadvertently preserved the perverse history of abuse and hypocrisy of the little world Dalio invented to flatter his own messiah complex.

Repeatedly, we see alpha personalities step on whomever they need to to get ahead, only to inevitably eventually slip up and get eviscerated by a master manipulator. You almost feel bad for them until you think about how many people they knifed before they got theirs.

At the end, I asked myself, what is this all for? Copeland makes a case that Bridewater's actual business is shockingly uncomplicated and unsophisticated modern finance standards. And the legacy of the philosophy around it is thoroughly discredited.

Joke's on all of us who ate it up, I guess.

Interesting and Exhausting

Imagine the worst job and boss possible for several years being distilled into several hours of an audio book. The reporting sounds accurate and the accounts credible. Bridgewater sounds like a lot of Bay Area tech companies in the same era. A lot of world changing apps that only benefit the company owner and VCs.

thank you for bursting the bubble surrounding this cult leader so I won't spend time following his words of wisdom

very interesting, but I have grown tired of books that drive anger, frustration and righteous indignation as if that were a noble goal. I just found myself yelling "WTH" at nearly every chapter, as this egotistical, narcissistic cult leader becomes one gazillionaire but running roughshod over anyone who disagrees with him. fortunately for all on the planet, he only ran a hedge fund and not a country.